Maneka, Javadekar spar over culling in man-animal conflict zones

Union Minister for Women and Child Development Maneka Gandhi today lashed out at her cabinet colleague and Union environment minister Prakash Javadekar, saying she could not understand the environment ministry’s ‘lust for killing’ animals.

Updated on: Jun 9, 2016, 19:31:37 IST

Hindustan Times | By Chetan Chauhan, New Delhi

Prefer HTon Google

Share via

Copy link

Two central ministers faced off over animals rights on Thursday with Maneka Gandhi slamming an “indiscriminate” killing of wildlife only to be told by Prakash Javadekar that the culling was for “scientific management” of rising vermin population.

Maneka Gandhi said she could not understand the environment ministry’s ‘lust for killing’ animals. (ANI Photo)

The confrontation put the spotlight back on conservation challenges in India due to shrinking wildlife habitats and growing human activities that have led to rising incidents of man-animal conflicts.

Around 500 wild boars and 200 blue bulls (nilgai) have been killed since the ministry started giving permission in December, 2014 to kill “vermin” – the official term used for animals considered unwanted -- in response to requests from states hit hard by human-animal conflicts.

Gandhi, the women and child development minister, held Javadekar personally responsible for killing the animals and said she could not understand the “lust for killing animals”.

“(The) environment ministry is writing to every state, asking which animal should be killed and that they will give permission for it,” said Gandhi, who was the environment minister in the previous NDA government.

“In Bengal, they (environment ministry) have permitted the killing of elephants, in Himachal Pradesh they have ordered killing of monkeys, and in Goa they gave permission to kill peacocks,” said Gandhi, a vocal animal rights campaigner.

Javadekar said the permissions to kill wildlife are targeted, scientifically safe and legal if requested by local authorities. His ministry officials denied Gandhi’s claim that permission has been granted for killing peacocks and elephants.

“It is not a programme of the central government. The law is such,” Javadekar said, referring to section 62 of the Wildlife Protection Act.

Every year, hundreds of acres of standing crops are destroyed by herds of animals that venture out of the forests in search of food. Efforts by people to protect their farmland often lead to fatalities on both sides.

Around 840 people have died in conflict with tigers and elephants since 2012 in India, according to recent government data. Though the number of animals killed in these conflict zones is officially around 35, activists say it does not include the leopards and elephants clubbed or poisoned by villagers.

The NDA government gave life to the provision of culling animals after former cabinet secretary TSR Subaramaniam asked the ministry to issue an advisory to state governments.

Junior agriculture minister Sanjeey Balyan also assured the states that animals would be allowed to be killed even though the advisory said it can be done only as the last resort.

However, proposals submitted by state governments reveal that most of them opted for culling without exploring other options.

Gandhi found support from animal rights groups such as People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals (PETA) and Prevention of Cruelty to Animals (PCA). They are likely to challenge the ministry’s permissions in the Supreme Court.

Animal rights activists say authorities should educate people on how to avoid conflicts with animals by using noisemakers and fences to prevent animals from encroaching on farmland, and better protect wild habitats from pollution and development.

ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Chetan Chauhan
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.Read More

Get the latest India News, breaking headlines and real-time updates from across the country. Stay informed about politics, government policies, crime, weather and major national developments.