Nepal poachers on prowl, tiger numbers down

The latest survey of the country’s tiger population shows big cat numbers have declined in north India, primarily due to poaching from across the border in Nepal and shrinking tiger habitats.

Updated on: Nov 27, 2014, 01:27:20 IST

Hindustan Times | By Chetan Chauhan, New Delhi

Prefer HTon Google

Share via

Copy link

The latest survey of the country’s tiger population shows big cat numbers have declined in north India, primarily due to poaching from across the border in Nepal and shrinking tiger habitats.

The-tigress-Baghani-was-transferred-to-Sariska-National-Park-in-an-attempt-to-bring-back-tigers-into-the-park-Photo-by-Aditya-singh

The survey, done every four years by the National Tiger Conservation Authority with Dehradun-based Wildlife Institute of India, shows tiger numbers in the Shivalik-Gangetic plains covering the three states of Uttarakhand, Uttar Pradesh and Bihar have come down to around 300 against about 320 four years ago.

“We are still verifying the ground data… the figure is not final,” an official told HT.

Forest department officials in Uttarakhand, who arrested over half a dozen tiger poachers in the past three years, said they saw an increase in the number of poachers from Nepal. Wildlife traffickers cross over to Nepal through the porous 1,751 km-long border India shares with the neighbouring country.

Officials said rising man-tiger conflict because of deteriorating habitat around the Corbett National Park was another area of concern.

“Habitat loss, leading to man-tiger conflict and increased pressure of poachers, have dented Corbett’s image,” a senior government official said, adding the national park may not see an increase in tiger numbers this time.

However, the most disturbing big cat story has emerged from Uttar Pradesh, where poor protection caused tiger numbers to fall, officials said. The number of tigers in the relatively new habitat in Pilibhit Tiger Reserve is said to have fallen to 23 in 2014 from 40 four years ago.

Dudwa Tiger Reserve officials said the tiger population in their forest was “stable”, even though the actual number may be seven to 10 tigers less than last time.

Tito Joseph of the Wildlife Protection Society of India that monitors tiger deaths in the country said there are several poacher gangs with links to Nepal.

“Najibabad in Uttar Pradesh, which is close to the Nepal border, has emerged as a major link to international wildlife traders,” he said.

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

Follow India news real-time updates and the latest news covered on Hindustan Times, featuring today's critical updates on Sonam Wangchuk LIVE and more across India.