Dead and Buried

Whither wildlife?

(from The Pioneer, April 16, 2006)

by
Prerna Singh Bindra

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An elephant cut to pieces, tigers poisoned. Can we protect our wild animals, asks Prerna Singh Bindra

The tusks are tightly wrapped in cheap white cotton cloth, but even through the shield and the red, government seal, they tell a gory tale. They are heavy, about seven kg each, long, with a gentle curve, but had not quite reached full length, rendered lifeless before their time.

The tusker had been silenced, well before his prime. Killed, its body chopped into pieces and buried - to avoid detection in a field in Majri village - behind some grotesque temple of amusement, appropriately named Fun Valley Park that sat bang on the elephants' ancient migratory path in the Barkot range adjoining Rajaji National Park.

It was mere chance that the incident came to light, some innocuous conversation at the local hooch bar overheard by guardians of the law. Emboldened by spirits, those employed to bury the dead complained of not being paid enough for such an elephantine task. Thus, inadvertently, leaking vital information that led to the unearthing the rotten, broken body of a magnificent male tusker that met an untimely, horrifying death. Only because it had strayed outside its degraded home in search for food, and water.

The above incident carries many stories. Of man-animal conflict that threatens to be a crisis of catastrophic proportions as natural habitats fragment, degrade and disappear. Of official and bureaucratic apathy; conversations with the villagers revealed that elephants habitually cross their path and they had been complaining to the forest department and the collector, but their voices remained unattended. Of our failure to protect rare, wild creatures. Of ancient cultures wearing thin, the elephant revered as Lord Ganesha, was now the enemy.

Prima facie, the late elephant of Barkot was a victim of conflict. Rajaji, once a magnificent part of the Terai jungles, is now just a vestige of its former glory - hemmed in, and slashed, by roads, canals, fields, shops, hotels, temples, industries, railways and just about anything imaginable. The pachyderms' forests are severely degraded, its migratory paths all but destroyed, leaving it with little choice but to stray into fields and "human territory".

So, how was it killed, I asked the range officer, Barkot, busy patting himself on the back for a job well done. After all, they had recovered the body and the tusks. He said, it was probably electrocution, it had not meant to kill an elephant (Really? It was a 22,000 watt live wire), and "only" meant to kill sambhar or wild boar. So, are these animals, also protected under the Wildlife Protection Act of the forest department is the custodians, not so important? This is an issue one is confronted with in most PAs and reserved forests across India, locals and even tourists, hunt "small game" routinely, for a bit of wild meat, or to prove their manhood or for plain old-fashioned fun. Which is yet another story.

So, I put that bit of information aside, and come back to the elephant, querying the park director later on the issue, who bemoaned (rightly) about the severe conflict situation. He said that he was not very aware of the facts of the case, since it was not in Rajaji, hence not under his purview. Strange, such indifference for an incident that occurred in his backyard. Barkot is the buffer range of the park, and since when did elephants know that they had crossed the sacred laxman rekha of Rajaji to venture into hostile territory? Another senior officer said that it was probably poisoning.

One month on, the cause is yet to determined. For the record, Uttaranchal has lost over 100 elephants in past five years, and these are only the reported deaths, a confidential report adds another 50 to the mortality. A few are admittedly natural deaths, many have succumbed to commercial greed, yet others are victims of animosity as conflicts get sharper, yet we have no anti-poaching strategy, just a spent force, over-the-hill and unmotivated, and no concrete strategies or plans to deal with conflict issues. Strategies, if there are any, rarely translate into action, remaining enshrined in the files of powers of corridor, to be periodically discussed in fancy conferences.

The death of the Barkot tusker is a ghastly tale, but hardly unique, and just another pointer to the conservation crisis that we face today. I would like to present a mosaic of recent events that detail the wildlife tragedy of our times, shows the insensitivity of those appointed to protect wildlife, and the slaughter that continues despite the facade of legal protection. But the bigger tragedy, is of continual denial: truth swept under the carpet, investigations delayed, facts concealed, bizarre excuses construed, and mythical figures conjured up to suppress reality and present a picture of "all's well with the wild" world.

A tigress died in Chilla, the tourist zone of Rajaji National Park on December 1, 2005. I met a forest guard there later (will keep him anonymous so that he retains his job), he dithers when I quire about the tigress. She was young, he says. She was killed, officially, by an elephant. Was it? The guard doesn't meet my eye, and I have my answer. I gather from other sources, that as in most cases, outsiders were kept away, a post-mortem was done post haste to avoid nasty questions. The inside story? The tigress had met its death under suspicious circumstances, in all probability poisoned, hence the hasty disposal of the "body".

It's a pattern that follows all such cases, this desperate bid to pass each death as natural, to keep outsiders at bay, lest the truth is leaked. In the last week of March, a tiger was poached, just outside Nagarhole, its whiskers and legs chopped off for trade. Five days later, on April 1, another tiger succumbed, apparently attacked by a crocodile.

Corbett Tiger Reserve. Four tigresses killed in two months, three in the buffer zone, the last one was killed on March 16 in Ramnagar forest division, apparently the handiwork of - save your breath - a tiger "lady killer". This striped Jack the Ripper, had apparently been on the prowl, slaughtering female tigers through the length and breadth of the park - since all the dead tigers had been found at great distance from each other.

My, my, a tiger serial killer! As cover-ups go, this one would definitely rank as the most bizarre. Evidence did not, could not, substantiate the claim. The explanation has changed in subsequent reports, the Director, Project Tiger, has been quoted saying that poisoning of two of the tigresses, which were cubs, is a possibility. But, he hastens to add, that the deaths however are not due to poaching! We did not even know it, and the wildlife law changes overnight! Since when does the killing of tigers through poisoning not fall under the ambit of poaching? Pause and ponder, sirs, it's a serious concern, and instead of playing Saving the Park Officials, the urgent task at hand is to Save the Tiger. And, yes, what about the other two tigresses? How did they die? Why hasn't there been any explanation, any accountability? We still await answers.

Even as I write this, information has come in of two leopard skins from Ranipur, part of Rajaji National park. The accused admitted that they had two other leopard skins, and that all four big cats had been killed in the Dholkand range of Rajaji, the least disturbed area. This is the core area, best protected. Or so we thought. Then how could a poacher camp (such a gruesome deed cannot happen in hours, the animal must be tracked, trapped, skinned, all of which is at the very least, a week's job) in the core area of a national park and kill four leopards? Think about it.

Incidentally, in the last ten days six leopards have been killed in this area alone. One was found, its leg caught in steel jaw trap behind the army hospital in Dehra Dun. It wasn't dead yet. Just in terrible, vicious agony. It is learnt, from confidential sources, that the animal was trapped in a cage many hours later, and hastily released in the wild. Great idea if done properly, but why was this done when the animal was seriously injured, and not fit for release? As expected, the leopard died subsequently.

Another leopard was found dead near Meerut this week, a bullet wound pierced in its heart. Conservative figures suggest that at least 250 leopards have died in Uttaranchal in the past five years. I suppose one should be gratified to know that there are still some leopards left to kill.

All these animals are protected under the Wildlife Protection Act, listed under Schedule I, yet the killing continues, unabated.

We know, of course, of Sariska, and the other awaiting Sariskas: Melghat, Indravati, Buxa. All flushed clean of tigers, or almost, by poachers. We know of the massacre at Ranthambhore, and at Panna where poachers confessed to having killed ten, and five tigers respectively.

One of the biggest scams in wildlife is the numbers game, the creation of mythical tigers, where few, or none exist. Had census figures reflected reality, we would have known that 18 tigers were not killed overnight in Sariska, there were never that many, that 47 tigers of Ranthambhore did not become 25 in a year, the park never had 47 tigers at that point in time. But even with this slap in the face, the pretence continues, a sham of a census was conducted in Panna last year.

Reports by scientists indicated that tiger numbers had fallen drastically, and to appease the detractors, a census was conducted in 2005, throwing up a figure of 35 tigers and a cub as against a population of 31 in 2001. Concrete scientific data over the previous five years was completely ignored. Hard data establishing the territories of only two radio-collared tigers was now said to be occupied by 22 adult tigers. Apparently, our tigers have now adapted to living in communes.

Presently, there is yet another census, going on Panna, and other tigers reserves of Madhya Pradesh, and if the early (and confidential) reports are to be believed, the outcomings are a shocker. The present figures of tigers in MP is around 700, of which about 40 per cent are said to be outside the reserves. Doubtful, if tigers fall prey to poaching inside parks, how can they survive in totally unprotected, degraded buffer areas, devoid of prey and undergrowth?

The new census shows that that tigers outside are near nil, and even inside PAs numbers have fallen drastically, I wonder though if these findings will ever see the light of the day. I wonder, too, if Madhya Pradesh can retain its title of "The Tiger State of India".

Chattisgarh is the new theatre of this farcical drama, the latest census says that number of tigers has declined from 239 to 200. If it wasn't a tragedy, it would be comical. Where are these tigers, pray? In Indravati Tiger Reserve, where no forest officer, or guard, dare enter for fear of naxals? Or the silent forests, devoid of all wild creatures, of Bhoramdeo, Udanti, Sitanadi and Achanakmar. Even the most optimistic estimate would not put the number of tigers in Chattisgarh above 50.

There are other massacres, of creatures lesser-known, and critically endangered species. This year, at least 3,000 Olive Ridley turtles were killed this year (over 1,50,000 in the last decade) by trawlers and gill-netters when they arrived for their annual arribada at Bhitarkanika in Orissa. And while they are massacred, we hasten up their slaughter by ill-planned projects like the Dhamra port, whose impact zone lies within the boundaries of the Bhitarkanika.

The National Board for Wildlife meets on April 27, can we expect the meeting to address these issues? Even if does, will they translate into action? The establishment of the Wildlife Crime Bureau, urgently recommended by the Prime Minister last year, is gathering dust in files in the Ministry of Environment and Forests.

Given the above scenario, the future for conservation in India appears bleak. It's heartbreaking, but I get the gut feel that in the new, liberal, consumerist India, on a high, there is little or no space for conservation, wildlife preservation and environment laws, all of which are increasingly seen as irritants and hiccups in the rush for development.

We are losing our reverence for nature. India used to pride itself for having successfully protected its tigers, it led the world in conservation. India, I fear, has now lost the honour.