The new tiger census’s estimate of an increase in India’s tiger population has brought into the forefront a fresh problem for the big cats in Kaziranga.
The new tiger census’s estimate of an increase in India’s tiger population has brought into the forefront a fresh problem for the big cats in Kaziranga.
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High tiger density and lack of habitats to move to is resulting in death of animals because of infighting and prey stress, says a report submitted by Tiger Research and Conservation Initiative, a body authorised by the environment ministry to monitor population in Kaziranga.
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Kaziranga in Assam has the highest tiger density — about 34 in 100-sq km area. But the forests have not expanded to accommodate the tigers. The recent deaths of three tigers have alarmed conservationists.
As per the 2008 tiger census, India has 1,411 tigers. Sources say preliminary results of a new census to be announced soon put the number of tigers over 1,500.
Of the three tigers discovered dead in Kaziranga, the first one died of natural causes, the second possibly died of injuries caused by a buffalo. It was the third case of a female tiger that indicated at the emerging anomaly. The female tiger had moved about 25 km from where she was first camera trapped in 2009. Conservation biologist at the initiative Feroz Ahmed, ruled out poaching or poisoning as cause of the death.
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His report, however, says, “As this is a high density area... I would expect more death in coming years mostly due to natural reasons as all subadult tigers are not able to establish a home range or go out of the park as there is hardly any habitat near the park that has a good prey base.”
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His report, however, says, “As this is a high density area... I would expect more death in coming years mostly due to natural reasons as all subadult tigers are not able to establish a home range or go out of the park as there is hardly any habitat near the park that has a good prey base.”
Chetan Chauhan is the National Affairs Editor looking into all aspects of news and features from across India. A Chevening scholar with over three decades of experience in reporting and news management, Chetan has extensively covered all important aspects of the social sector, political economy, environment and climate change nationally and internationally. He did a journalism course at the Reuters Institute of Journalism in Oxford and Digital Media training at Nanyang Technological University in Singapore. He started as a reporter with The Statesman in 1996 and joined the Hindustan Times in 2000 in the metro bureau covering environment, crime and Delhi politics. He covered hot local news, from the Jessica Lal murder case to the rebellion of Delhi Congress MLAs against then Chief Minister Sheila Dikshit, to the replacement of toxic vehicle fuel with cleaner compressed natural gas (CNG) in the national capital. Some of his stories on air pollution became part of the Supreme Court’s landmark MC Mehta versus Government of India case in the National Capital Region (NCR), forcing the government to take corrective measures. As part of the national political bureau since 2004, he covered important central sectors such as environment, education, social justice, labour, rural development, water resources, renewable energy, agriculture, broadcasting and the Planning Commission for more than a decade producing several exclusive and investigative breaking stories. His specialisation is the environment, having covered at least a dozen United Nations global conferences on climate change, biodiversity and wildlife including climate summits in Paris, Copenhagen and Bali. He also covered India’s two five-year plans ---11th and 12th and reported on drafting and execution of right based laws such as Right to Education, Right to Information and rural job guarantee law, MG-NREGA, now being introduced in new format as VG-RAM-G Act. He has in-depth knowledge of social sector issues. He was one of the first to report on tigers vanishing from Sariska and Panna wildlife reserves in 2004 and 2008, respectively, leading to the setting up of the National Tiger Conservation Authority (NTCA) and the introduction of stringent penal provisions for poaching. He has written extensively on the rising human-animal conflict in India and the degradation of India’s biodiversity hotspots because of mining and other activities. Since 2004, Chetan has covered Parliament comprehensively and participated in training on the nuanced coverage of Parliament proceedings. He has travelled extensively across India to cover national and provincial elections since 1998, especially in the Hindi heartland states, considered India’s road to power. He writes a regular column for Hindustan Times, Ecostani, on important national politics, economy, Himalayan ecology and environmental issues. His other responsibilities include providing inputs for edits and edit page articles for the publication, apart from managing news flow from across India.
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