Two tiger poisoned in Ranthambhore Tiger Reserve
At around 1000 hours in the morning the Deputy Field Director of Ranthambhore national park (RS Shekhawat) called me and asked me to reach the Tadla chowki (or Forest Guard House) near Banas river as soon as possible, along with MD Parasher. He told me that the two “Chiroli cubs” were dead, probably poisoned and that he was inside the Ranthambhore national park and heading to the area where this happened. He wanted both of us to be an “independent witness” to the case.
I got in touch with MD Parasher (an artist based in Ranthambhore) and we left for the Tadla in a few minutes. When we reached the chowki there was a guard waiting for us and from there we drove towards a small village called “Tadla ka khet” about a mile ahead of Amli Deh (a deep water pool in the river). This area is across the river Banas and lies in the Baler forest range, at the edge of the Keladevi sanctuary, which is a part of Ranthambhore tiger reserve. We met up with RS Shekhawat, Range Officer Daulat Singh and the Range Officer Baler at the edge of river Banas, just beyond Amli Deh. There were about a dozen forest guards with them. The Deputy Director confirmed that the two cubs (actually sub adult tigers who had separated from their mother slightly over two months ago) were dead.
The location:
The “Tadla ka khet” village lies in the midst of ravines between the Banas river basin and the Keladevi plateau. The terrain is typical of the ravines that are found along Chambal river and its tributaries – steep and low sand cliffs that have been cut by monsoon rain fed “nallah” (streams) and there is little level ground in the entire area. There is some level ground near the village, which is used for farming.
There are very few large mammals that can be seen there in the day because of the disturbance by goat herders. One does see a lot of hoof prints and droppings so mammals like Nilgai, Wild boar, Sambar etc must be using the area, more so during the nights, when there are no herders around.
There are about 5 extended families in this small village of farmers and goat herders. Only one of these five families does not rear goats, while the other mainly depend on goat rearing for their living.
Technically this area is in the Baler range of the Keladevi Sanctuary, as it is across the river Banas but for the last two (more or less) years its management comes under the Deputy Director Ranthambhore national park and not under the Deputy Director Karauli, who administers the rest of Keladevi Sanctuary.
View Tadla ka khet in a larger map
Ranthambhore tiger reserve consists of the Ranthambhore national park, keladevi sanctuary, Sawai Mansingh sanctuary, Sawaimadhopur sanctuary, Kuwalji protected area and some smaller protected areas.
The tigers:
The two tigers that died are supposed to be 16 to 17 months old though they appeared to be older than that to me. The forest department informed us that they were first camera trapped about 13-14 months ago in the Chiroli area of the Kundera range of Ranthambhore national park. That is why they are known as the Chiroli cubs. As far as I know, they were never ever seen in any of the tourist zones and there are very few photographs of this family. They must have been regularly picked up in the camera traps in Chiroli and Bheed area of the national park but since these areas are out of bound for us I do not know much about these tigers. These two cubs had separated from their mother somewhere in January 2010 and since then had moved out of the national park to the Baler range of Keladevi sanctuary, which is a part of the tiger reserve. Right now Ranthambhore national park has far too many male tigers so the moment male cubs separate from their mother they have to start looking for a territory in the fringes of the national park. The other more dominant males ensure that they have to do that. In the last few months almost all the tigers that are moving out of the national park are young males that have just separated from their mother.
What happened on 7th March 2010 (Sunday):
Parasher and I reached near Tadla ka khet by 1100 hours. We parked about a 100 meters away from where the tigers were lying dead and where there were three other forest department jeeps. By that time the forest guards and officers had tracked the entire area but I decided to do it again for my information. The Deputy Director and the other officers present informed us that a team of forest officers and guards were searching the village and the area around for the people who could have done this. One of the forest guards (Lakshmi Pandit, who I know well from before), told me that the guards from Tadla ki chowki had seen pugmarks of the tigers on the 4th and 5th March at some distance but did not find any pugmarks on the 6th. On the 7th morning while tracking this area they smelt rotting flesh and that is how they found the dead tigers.
We walked a short distance from there to the place where the one of cubs was lying dead. This tiger (tiger 1) was lying at the edge of a dry streambed (nallah). A few meters ahead along the same nallah we saw a carcass of a goat that had been almost totally consumed. The area around this goat’s carcass was full of tiger pugmarks. Between the goat’s carcass and the dead tiger there were two tiger scats and one patch of dark vomit. Lopped off branches of thorny Acacia tree were placed around the carcass in such a way that there was only one easy way (the one on the steam bed) to get to this carcass. This was obviously done to “lead” the tiger to the goat’s carcass. The Tadla ka khet village was not more than 500 meters (as the crow flies) from this place.
About 50 feet away from this goat’s carcass, on a low mud hill, there was a lot of goat hair lying on the ground. From this place there were drag marks and human footprints to a Salvadora tree. On top of this tree was a carcass of another goat and some branches were lopped off on this tree. It was clear that some people had dragged this goat’s carcass to the tree and then placed it on a branch of the tree after lopping some small branches off.
The body of the other male tiger (Tiger 2) was lying in the open, in a saucer shaped basin, about a 100 meters away from that of the first tiger’s body. This tiger’s body was not as badly decomposed as the first ones. In fact both the bodies were not too badly decomposed. Predators decompose really fast and usually there is nothing left in 3 or 4 days time, particularly in months like March, which are pretty hot. There were broad drag marks leading away from this tiger’s body. I followed these drag marks. The marks led to a small shady Acacia tree. It was obvious that this tiger (Tiger 2) had rested and vomited under this tree for some time and then he dragged himself from this tree to the point where he finally died. This was obvious from the width of the drag marks, which had “stretched out” pugmarks and vomit spots on them. There were hyena and jackals pugmarks all over the place and it was clear that some animal had tried to eat this tiger’s carcass but had given up. A part of this tigers flank was opened up but hardly anything at all was consumed.
From reading the tracks around (I had a good couple of hours to do so) I concluded the following:
A little after noon, the team of veterinary doctor, forensic expert from Sawai Madhopur mobile Forensic unit, few other government officers and local police had arrived. By then almost all the officers of Ranthambhore tiger reserve, including the Field Director, four Assistant Conservator of Forests, two more Forest Rangers and many forest guards had arrived. Post mortem was conducted on the tigers and the goats and forensic samples were collected. A Field report was written up both Parasher and I signed it as independent witnesses. The carcasses of both the tigers and the goats were then burnt till there was nothing left. One interesting thing that the veterinary doctor told us that there were two cut marks (probably made with an axe) on the body of tiger 1. These were made after the tiger had died.
Sometimes around noon some members of the team of forest officials who were searching the neighborhood for people came back to inform the DFO that they did not find any one in the Tadla ka khet village, except one young man and one old sick man. All of them had run away when they saw the first Forest Department jeep arrive. They did find a few women form the village in their fields on the Banas riverbed. The forest officers were interrogating this young man and some other people who were working in the fields on the riverbank (about half a kilometer away from this spot). A few of them informed us that the dead goats belonged to a man called Ram Khiladi Gujjar from Tadla ka khet. All through this time we could hear men shouting (to each other) and looking at the proceedings from top of the plateau. They were clearly visible but I could not make out what they were shouting. This went on for a few hours. We could see these people but to get to the top of the plateau would have taken any one of us more than an hour. So there was no chance of catching them.
It was close to sunset by then and most of us (Parasher, the doctors and forensic people etc) left. The entire forest department team stayed behind to conduct raids in the area.
I tried calling up the Deputy Director on Sunday night before I went to sleep but could not get through to him. They had not returned from the area of operation.
The next morning I called the Deputy Director as soon as I got up and what he told me was that they were conducting raids in the area till late in the night. They had managed to apprehend two main accused – Ram Khiladi Gujjar (the owner of the goats that had been killed by the tigers) and one of his friends / relatives Mukesh Gujjar. The Deputy Director also mentioned that these two main accused had told them that on the afternoon of the 4th March the two tigers had attacked the heard of goats and killed two goats. The tigers had injured a third goat that later died in the village. The herders managed to scare the two tigers off the kill. They put one of the goat’s body on top of the tree while they guarded the second goat’s body (to keep the tigers away). Ram Khiladi went to the nearby Khandar town and bought a bottle of strong pesticide (locally known as Aldrin though it is a different brand) and some syringes. He and Mukesh injected one of the goat’s carcass with this pesticide a number of times and poured the rest of the pesticide in the offal’s of the goat. They then left the poisoned goat in the nallah and cordoned a part of the nallah off with thorny branches. By the time they finished doing that it had become dark. That night the tigers did not return to the kill. However, the next night (on the 5th March) both the tigers came back and ate the entire poisoned goat. The two accused found the bodies of the tiger the next morning just after sunrise.
Unfortunately these two tigers died because the three goats that these two tigers killed were more precious for the herders than two living tigers. Rupees 2000 (about 40 US dollars) of financial loss for two people killed two living tigers. This unfortunately is the reality of tiger conservation in wild India and no amount of campaigning can change this. Unless a living tiger has financial value for most of the people who live near tiger habitats, tiger are not going to survive.
Wildlife migration corridors from Ranthambhore
JAIPUR: After Ranthambore and Sariska, Darrah. Rajasthan is all set to get its third tiger reserve, and India its 39th, very soon. The National Tiger Conservation Authority (NTCA) has given its in-principle approval to the project at Darrah National Park, which is about 50 km from Kota.
State forest department officials said it was very likely that the first tiger would be relocated to the forests of Darrah by 2011.
The state government had submitted a proposal to the Centre for a tiger reserve at Darrah. NTCA has given its in-principle approval to it. The surplus tigers of Ranthambore will be translocated to Darrah after the area is declared a tiger reserve under Section 83 (v) of the Wildlife Protection Act 2006, said state forest and environment minister Ramlal Jat.
According to the minister, once declared a sanctuary, it will help form a large corridor connecting Sariska, Kota, Bundi and Ranthambore to Madhya Pradesh. This will not only take away the excess visitors from Ranthambore but also help Kota attract a large number of tourists, he said.
The Darrah National Park, also called the Rajiv Gandhi National Park, consists of three wildlife sanctuaries of Darrah, Chambal and Jaswant Sagar. It was declared a national park in 2004 and is spread over a total area of 250 km. It is separated from the Ranthambore national park by another 250 sq km stretch of Ramgarh Vishdhari Wildlife Sanctuary.
The park is the only one to have a perennial source of water from the Chambal Basin with the river running 4 to 5 metres deep in certain stretches.
(The Times of India, TNN 7 November 2009, 05:21am IST)
After reading this I did not know whether to laugh or cry.
The NTCA is in a rush to declare more and more forests as tiger reserves. The fact that a lot of the newly declared reserves, neither have any tiger nor any prey, does not seem to make any difference. Declaring the “Rajiv Gandhi National Park” as a tiger reserve would be really pushing it. In fact it would be a big joke.
The Rajasthan Forest Minister’s statement – “ The surplus tigers of Ranthambore will be translocated to Darrah after the area is declared a tiger reserve ………once declared a sanctuary, it will help form a large corridor connecting Sariska, Kota, Bundi and Ranthambore to Madhya Pradesh. This will not only take away the excess visitors from Ranthambore but also help Kota attract a large number of tourists” – is absolutely ridiculous.
What the minister does not know or did not state is:
1. Ranthambhore does not have surplus tigers : the current official figure is that there are 41 tigers in Ranthambhore tiger reserve. The Ranthambhore tiger reserve is 1334 square kilometers in area. Areas that have 10 or so tigers in 100 square kilometers is considered to be a high density area. By this logic 41 in 1334 square kilometers is not really high, so where do the surplus come from? The ral story is that out of the 1334 kms of Ranthambore tiger reserve - about half the area is the Kela Devi Sanctuary, about one fourth is the Ranthambore national park and most of the balance is the Sawai Mansingh snactuary. (See the map below). The 41 tigers are distributed in the entire tiger reserve as follows - Kela Devi has one, Sawai Mansingh has 5 or 6 and the national park has the rest. In other words, half of the entire tiger reserve just has one tiger and almost all the tigers are within the national park or the immediately adjoining part of the Sawai Mansingh sanctuary. It would be correct to say that the national park has a surplus of tigers but the same can not be said for the entire tiger reserve. In fact Sawai Mansingh sanctuary only gets tigers when there is a surplus inside the national park and Kela Devi sanctuary (which is nearly half the area of the total reserve) has hardly had any tigers in the last decade or so. Tiger do drift there from the national park but they do not last very long in this sanctuary, mainly because this sanctuary has very little prey and almost no protection.
2. There already is a corridor between Ranthambhore national park and Darrah wildlife sanctuary via the forests of Sawai Mansingh sanctuary, Lakheri, Talwas and Ramgarh sanctuary. Tiger in the past have gone all the way to Darrah and in the near future have been going till the forests of Lakheri. In reality this corridor is a death trap because in the last 10 years not a single tiger that drifted this way survived for long. There is very little prey and even less protection south of the Sawai Man Singh sanctuary. The adjoining forests of Madhya Pradesh (MP) are in an even worse state, in fact, this part of MP is the poaching heartland of India. Till about two decades ago this entire corridor was an excellent wilderness area. The last tigers of Darrah and Ramgarh died out without making any noise at all) in the early 1990s. Since then this corridor has been taking a thrashing at the hands of man. Right now the forest canopy still exists but the prey species (deer, wild pigs etc) are gone. There is a lot of cattle that the tiger can kill but that leads to conflicts with man, which are often lethal for the wild animal.
3. The above mentioned corridor has no links whatsoever with Sariska, which is a true “ecological island” with no scope at all for any inwards or outward migration of wild animals. For a tiger to get from Sariska to Ranthambhore, he will have to cross a very busy national highway, miles and miles of agricultural fields, numerous villages and at least three large towns besides a number of small ones. A really tough task for any tiger.
4. This will not only take away the excess visitors from Ranthambore but also help Kota attract a large number of tourists, said the minister. This is a pretty heavy price to pay to attract tourists to Kota.
What is needed is active and prolonged protection along this forested belt and it needs to be done now. A few years later may be too late. What is definitely not needed is to tranquilize a few tigers from inside Ranthambhore national park and fly them to Darrah Sanctuary and hope that they flourish there. Some of these tigers may have to turn vegetarian in Darrah since there is not enough meat on hooves there for them.
Don’t just take my word for it. Read what the Ranthambhore Project Tiger Management Plan 2001-2011 has to say about this (pasted below). The last para is the most interesting. (RTR means Ranthambhore tiger reserve and RNP is the Ranthambhore national park).
Ecological Boundaries:-
The flora and fauna of both Vindhyan and Aravalli hill ranges exist in the Ranthambhore Tiger Reserve. The forests of both the ranges were continuous in the past but due to fragmentation of vegetation cover the RTR has become an ecological island.
The RNP adjoins Keladevi sanctuary in the N.E. separated by river Banas, but the river does not present any barrier for the wild life to cross over. The Keladevi sanctuary is linked to the forest areas of Dholpur through a continuous forest tract. The forests of Keladevi sanctuary are gradually improving with increased level of protection, ban on migratory sheep and participatory forest protection strategy adopted by the villagers in the form of “Kulhadi Band (ban on use of axe) Panchayat” under the guidance of forest department.
In the south west of the RNP, Sawai Mansingh Sanctuary & Kuwalji Closed Area extend up to river Chakal and beyond. The adjoining forest areas of Bundi further connects RTR to forest areas of Kota. Therefore, a whole corridor is available for the movement of wildlife provided the adjoining areas of Dholpur, Bharatpur, Bundi and Kota districts also gets adequate protection. In fact, the area mentioned above can be a contiguous area for the Tiger.
The river Chambal in South to South East of RTR and the river Banas in North East to South East of the RNP forms a seasonal barrier to the wildlife to migrate from one area to another but there are reports of occasional presence of non-resident wild dogs in RTR and migration of wild animals such as Tigers and Leopard in Keladevi Sanctuary from M.P. forest area crossing the Chambal river as per the indirect evidences gathered from the Maharaja of Karauli.
On all other sides, RTR is surrounded by agricultural revenue land but the abundant presence of Black buck, Chinkara, Blue Bull, Smaller cats, Jackals & Foxes in the agricultural fields indicate that there is no barrier to these mammals and the area as a whole is rich in wildlife. Even tigers and panthers are reported from the habitation areas like Chouth Ka Barwada & Bhagwatgarh, which are nearly 30 Kms from RTR.
We may say that a belt of 50 Kms width along the left banks of the river Chambal from Kota up to Dholpur can be considered as the ecological boundary for the Tigers and other wild life of RTR.
The description given above indicates that a large tract constitutes the ecological boundary of RTR, but the fact remains that with the degradation of forest area, expansion of agriculture fields and other land uses, the ecological boundary tends to limit up to RTR area only in a true sense.
View Rajasthan Wildlife Corridors in a larger map
A great article
Wildlife is on the brink
Wildlife is on the brink and it is high time we took a critical look at our conservation realities
and policies.
Most that share landscapes with wildlife, for instance, live extremely low
impact lives yet they pay the biggest cost for conservation.
Question of survival: Tribal settlements in Orissa¹s Simlipal Biosphere
Reserve.
If there is one dominating sense about the fate of wildlife in this country,
it is that of Œthe end¹. The wiping out of the tiger from the Sariska and
Panna Tiger Reserves has been headline news; poaching and trading in
wildlife parts con tinues unabated; human wildlife conflict ‹ be it with
carnivores like leopards or tigers, large mammals like elephants or smaller
animals like wild boar, deer or monkeys ‹ is seriously on the rise; lakes,
rivers and other wetlands are either being dammed, poisoned or encroached
upon; climate change threatens to change the world in an unprecedented
manner and as a combined consequence wildlife numbers are dwindling
precariously and many species of birds, animals and plants stand dangerously
close to the precipice of extinction.
The Forest Rights Act
An important new twist was added to wildlife conservation debates a couple
of years ago with the enactment of the Scheduled Tribes and Other
Traditional Forest Dwellers (Recognition of Forest Rights) Act, popularly
known as the Forest Rights Act (FRA). The debate over this act has been
volatile and the opposition, particularly from a section of wildlife
conservationists and former forest officers, has been and continues to be
strong. A lot has been written about these concerns and strong affirmation
came from a rather unlikely source around a year ago. A report in Newsweek
(³India¹s missing tigers², May 5, 2008) took the argument to an unexpected
extreme when it argued that Œdemocracy and economic development¹ were
driving the tiger to extinction in India.
Many might actually agree with this articulation, but even a cursory
analysis will reveal that the conclusions are as ill-informed as they are
short sighted. An entire argument cannot be built on the analysis of and
comment on just one piece of recent legislation in the country: the FRA. The
law is a recent one and its implementation, if it is happening at all, has
just about begun. While fears about forest and wildlife loss may indeed be
justified, selectively wiping away history and placing the responsibility
for the tiger¹s demise at the door of this one legislation and one set of
people is not only irresponsible but also can be counter-productive.
Particularly so since because one aspect of India¹s conservation history ‹
the role of former Prime Minister Indira Gandhi ‹ continues to be repeatedly
invoked, like in the Newsweek piece. A whole generation of wildlife
enthusiasts and conservationists believe, and with good reason, that Indira
Gandhi ensured that Indian wildlife still has some hope. She was the
architect of critical legislations and frameworks that certainly helped
protect wildlife and her personal interest and intervention like in the case
of Silent Valley in Kerala ensured that many critical habitats were saved.
It is a legacy we cannot deny or wish away, but we also need to ask whether
we can keep hanging on to the past? Our socio-political-economic-cultural
realities have changed drastically since her time. It is the same nation and
yet it is different . Wildlife conservation today, like anything else, has
to be placed within this rapidly changing context. It is crucial to
recognise that the same wildlife conservation policies will not succeed
today just because they did in a different era. If she were alive today,
Mrs. Gandhi would perhaps have agreed.
There is also a whole new Œpost-Indira Gandhi¹ generation of wildlife
biologists involved in cutting edge research across wild India. Many of
their formulations of problems and solutions are extremely nuanced and far
more representative of realities on the ground. They need to be asked and
they need to be listened to.
Condemning the most vulnerable
It is no one¹s case that wildlife conservation is easy. The challenges are
immense and no one but the most optimistic will argue that the future for
our wildlife is bright and hopeful. However, blaming the poor and the
tribal; demanding their displacement to protect wildlife; seeking stricter
and military-like protection is the wrong place to start. By doing this we
are also ignoring many other realities. Most of the communities that share
landscapes with wildlife, for instance, live extremely low impact lives and
yet they are made to pay the biggest cost for conservation.
It is also not a coincidence that innumerable people¹s agitations across the
country today are fighting policies and projects (big dams, large scale
mining, increased industrialisation) that predate on the basic survival of
forest and land dependant communities. Neither is it a coincidence that many
of these are important habitats that support a great diversity of threatened
flora and fauna. It is as important that we recognise this overlap as it is
for us to recognise that both communities and wildlife are, together, losing
this battle. Nothing ‹ be it the laws and the courts, the politicians and
the bureaucrats or the media and the wildlife conservationists ‹ are able to
help them.
Hope and the FRA
Increased mining across the country, for instance, has been one of the most
significant sources of concern for its impact on forests, tribal communities
and important wildlife populations. In an ironic twist now, it is being
suggested that the FRA might actually be the only hope for preventing mining
in forest and wildlife rich areas. Efforts towards this end are already
being made in states like Orissa and in particular in the Niyamgiri hills
where the Dongaria Kondh Tribal community itself is fighting to save the
forests. Additional hope has been kindled following the July 30, 2009
notification of the MoEF stating the forest land diversion for non-forest
purposes should ensure compliance with the provisions of the FRA.
In this larger context then, it comes across as completely unfair to argue
that rights for the poor, the marginalised and the historically
dis-privileged necessarily means the demise of our wildlife? Can we turn the
question and wonder if, in fact, ³it is not too much democracy but too
little of it that lies at the root our wildlife crisis?² That a more
empowered people might actually fight better and more successfully? We don¹t
have the answers today; what we do have is the choice of which question we
will ask.
Interesting email exchange
Interesting email exchange between Deepali and your truly. Deepali is a naturalist, photographer and economist from Delhi. I got her permission to share this on the blog.
From: Deepali Sharma Sanwal
Date: Tue, 12 May 2009 11:11:25 +0530
To: Aditya Singh
Subject: hi from Delhi
Hi Aditya
Hello from Delhi. Read your blog.. wanted to read something on conservation after my postings and your replies on INW (www.indianaturewatch.net/forum/viewtopic.php?t=2362)
..I am astonished to find that the name of the poachers are so common knowledge to forest department !
interesting blog ( www.dickysingh.com) and great photos on your website ( www.ranthambhore.com).. had a word with poonam few days back as we were planning to come down to ranthambhore but the plan did not materialize.. hoping to make it sometime in June !
Regards
Deepali
–
There is an economist in all of us.
On Tue, May 12, 2009 at 5:17 PM, Aditya Singh wrote:
Hi Deepali,
Sorry you could not make it down but the end of June (from 20th onwards – park shuts on the 30th) maybe a better time. Somewhere in the mid of June we get one or two showers (just a few days after Delhi gets them) and the park just changes colors instantly. The weather and the scenery is much better after that.
I will tell you some interesting facts about poaching and tiger conservation around Ranthambhore region. I am sure these are true for all of India but since I have spent 11 years in this area, I have more examples from here.
1. The “Ranthambhore poaching region” includes Rajasthan and Madhya Pradesh till Panna. This area includes all of Rajasthan’s Aravalis (good for leopards), most of river Chambal (crocs, gharials and otters), Sariska, Kuno (MP), Madhav national park (but there is nothing left there to kill and a poacher told us this) and Panna. The same guys operate in all these place. This is particularly true for the dealers and not so much for the shooters/trappers.
2. It is generally made out to be by the NGOs working in “anti-poaching” line that poachers are very secretive, very organized, very dangerous etc etc – which is a load of bullshit. They probably say so to boost their own image and get more people interested. In reality everyone locally, including the forest department, knows the names of the shooters/trappers (at least they know all the gang leaders and reputed poachers), of the buyers, of the couriers etc. It is such common knowledge that if you walked in here and did not know anyone – you could collect most of the data in a week by just asking around in the villages. Most of these people occupy the lowest social spectrum in the caste set up and they are scared of the upper castes. We have often walked into their houses and caught them. They had guns and other arms but would not dare use it against a local upper caste person.
3. The big buyer here is on old woman (and now her two sons) called Munni Bai. She has been doing this for over 30 years and most people around here know of her. At least everyone in the local forest department does. It is only the leading conservationists and senior officers in the forest department at Jaipur and Delhi level who don’t. She is not really the end buyer but she collects stuff and sells it to buyers in Gwalior, Guna etc who further sell is to the big boys in Delhi, Kanpur, Khaga etc.
4. The big centre for leopard skins is Hissar and one of their main guy here is known as “Pal.” He visits this area once or twice a year and has been doing it for over 20 years.
5. At the ground level there is no body working on anti poaching. Here Dharmendra Khandal of Tiger Watch is the only person working on collecting information on poachers. Besides him – no one. No Forest department, no police, no NGO. The problem that he faces is that he has the information about the bad guys but what can he do with it. The forest department does not want the information, the police generally speaking does not work on it because most of the time they need to cross the boundaries of the district. The general attitude is that if it is not happening in my beat it is OK.
6. The big boys of conservation - few well-known megalomaniac personalities who have cornered the conservation limelight/profits (believe me it is very profitable) and the Project Tiger (or NTCA) - are living in an elite dream world and are hopelessly out of touch with reality. They have a mutually beneficial relationship based on you scratch my back and I scratch yours.
The basic problem with tiger conservation (in fact all conservation) in India is:
1. It is too centralized and elitist. All our conservation planning is done by people who are basically rich, based in metros and are very far removed from the ground reality. As a result their plans just do not work and have not been working for over 25 years. After 25 years of failure they are still in the driving seat. This includes the Project Tiger, Supreme Court’s Special Empowered Committee etc etc. Any ground level conservation initiative is killed as soon as it starts becoming popular. The only conservation initiatives that have worked in the world are those which had support at ground level. We have such funny ones – like there was “an anti-poaching workshop” here two years ago, which was (and I am not joking) “a black tie and caviar affair, where no locals were invited.” Most of the villagers here believe that the national park was sold off by the government 20 years ago to foreigners and rich Indian – for their entertainment.
2. It is too unscientific. There has been no decent research done on tigers for the last 45 years. Schaller in Kanha did the last one in mid 1960s. The data on the basis of which conservation planning is done in India is totally false and has been falsified for the last 30 years. How can you come out with a workable solution if the data that you have it totally false.
3. It is too low priority. The government does not care, the rulers do not care, the conservationists do not care – basically we all talk but rarely act. There is no will, no funds, no responsibility and no workable plans. This for an industry that generated over US $ 2 Billion per annum and employs huge amount of people, who are often the poorest of the poor.
Sounds depressing? We got over it some time ago. Some one has to catch the bull by the horns and only then would things begin to change.
Regards,
–
Aditya Singh,
From: Deepali Sharma Sanwal
Date: Wed, 13 May 2009 09:37:38 +0530
To: Aditya Singh
Subject: Re: hi from Delhi
Hi Aditya
I could not agree more with you on so many points made by you!! Though I hardly know too much and most of my ideas are from the observations I have made.
I am indeed surprised to some extent ( though not fully..no one can be who has lived and traveled in India ) that majority of people involved in this whole exercise of conservation are too far away from all this. ( Though most of us are.. and it really takes lots of guts like you did to be actually based right there leaving aside more lucrative earning options in a big city).
I strongly feel that tiger conservation needs to go beyond what it is doing right now. In my opinion people who reside inside or around really can no way be the biggest culprits as they are made to sound sometimes. It is generally the elitist who want the best without really wanting to pay a price involved. Moreover, I feel it has become an in-thing to say that ” I am into wildlife”.. probably it just means that “I visit national parks over weekends to click picture” ( no harm in that too though. people have their own objectives).
I feel the best conservation practices would come only when people who are involved in their daily lives are a part of it and also derive benefits from it..like benefits from tourism. One of the best practices and also one which I thought was working very well was what I saw in Valley of flowers. It is being maintained by joint cooperation of forest department and villagers. The place and the long trek upto the valley is so clean and well maintained, with all facilities for visitors that it comes across strikingly as a very good best practice example. I am sure there are may such examples all over that operate efficiently and silently.
As for conservation, in general, I still have my doubts with its role and placement within the Survival of fittest Darwin theory.. maybe I need to understand it from science.. but the growing human-animal conflict makes one ponder about it. ( last Sunday’s supplement in The Hindu carries three articles regarding HAC)
Lastly, most of the problems we face today are purely due to human GREED.. we ALL want our cake and eat it too.. whether it’s the financial crisis ( which as an economist, I can vouch is largely due to factors that standard theory might not be able to address) or problems of climate change and conservation… something we are not being able to control !
But I am sure there would be a way out else nature has its own way to correct disequilibrium!
Thanks Aditya for explaining in such great details.. am sure there is so much more I need to learn !
Best
Warm regards
Deepali
On Tue, May 13, 2009 at 3:22 PM, Aditya Singh wrote:
Hi Deepali,
Thanks for your mail.
I am actually making a fairly lucrative earning here (for Ranthambhore standards). In the last 11 years I have morphed from and into - a hotel owner/manager, naturalist, conservationist, photographer, traveler, activist and a local farmer. Before I came to Ranthambhore I worked for the Central Government for a short time, so I kind of understand how the government works. As a result, my problem is that I have been here for too long and pretty much understood how the whole wheel turns.
Regards,
Aditya
PS: If I had to sum up the present scenario in most tiger reserves in India, I would do it like this. [To really understand it you have to read between the lines and have a clear understanding of the keywords].
The existing situation in most tiger reserves in India is as follows:
The people who reside around the reserves that have decent wildlife are definitely not the “culprits” that they are made out to be by the “experts” and the “trendy.” Neither are they God’s own creatures as the “leftists make them out to be.”
The people who reside around the reserves are mostly “poor (with a dash of rich)” and for generations they depended on the forest for some “renewable resources” such as fuel wood, fodder, some minor forest produce “etc”.
The problem that they have is that since the forest around their villages has now been declared a “tiger reserve” it is gradually getting “more and more illegal” for them to get their requirements from the forest.
The problem that the “forest managers” have is that the population in their villages has gone up tremendously due to improved medical conditions. The forest just cannot support the needs of all locals. It could do with “lesser disturbance” as more disturbance means less wildlife.
The locals need to fulfill these “needs, so they do it illegally.”
The forest managers are “overwhelmed” by the sheer numbers of locals and are unable to stop them, so they turn a “blind eye” towards it.
The planners, experts and trendy (which is the entire lobby), however, insist that everything should be “strictly legal” as they had a big hand in “making the law (which is blinder than a bat)”. So the planners are “told” that everything is going on as per the law. The planners take it as good feedback and on the basis of this they make more laws and plans. They “periodically check” the ground to see the ground reality for themselves and almost always end up agreeing with the “feed back.”
Thus the cycle repeats itself.
I think our problem can be summed up in four points:
1. Our centralized federal planning does not even take into consideration the ground realities.
2. The implementation of the plan is done by a state government agency that is the lowest priority for most state governments.
3. There are too few voters for wildlife in India.
4. Greed at all levels.
–
Aditya Singh
Mails from Dharmendra
Sorry for not writing for a long time but I had been busy traveling (basically having a good time).Sorry for not writing for a long time but I had been busy traveling (basically having a good time).
I got a few mails from Doctor Dharmendra Khandal – the Field Biologist of Tiger Watch, a local non profit organization that is doing some amazing anti-poaching work in and around Ranthambhore. He knows more about the local poachers and their network than any other person. I have pasted below the mails without making any changes (except for some very cosmetic ones). They are alarming and go to show that despite all the media storm about dwindling tiger in India, despite all the “action taken” by the government noise made by our “conservationists” – at the ground level nothing has changed.
You should be alarmed too.
END JANUARY 2009
Hi,
Rajasthan police and Tiger Watch team ( Lokesh,Lakhan and me) caught a wanted poacher Battilal.
He is wanted since November 2005 in a Tiger Poaching case. He is the real brother of Devisingh Mogya (a dreaded tiger poacher).
Recently 10-13 Mogyas came from Madhya Pradesh (the adjoining state in Central India) side to Ranthambhore for the work of crop protection. All these people are potential poachers and all of them have illegal guns and they can harm Ranthambhore at many levels.
regards,
dharmendra khandal
PS: Ranthambhore Deputy Field Director Mr. Shekhaweat is busy in VIP tourism and Assittant Conservator of Forests Mr. Sudarshan Sharma is busy in managing tourism.
4-5 other patroling vehicles are also busy in tourism………….
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| From Ranthambhore |
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| From Ranthambhore |
END JANUARY 2009
Hi,
The first raid has been successfully complete. We have found two Bagaria tribal poachers and one illegal weapon. They were operating in Sawai Mansingh sanctuary area and regularly killing wild animals for bushmeat.
Sawai Madhopur’s Superintendent of Police Mr. Kaviraj Sharat provided a wonderful team of police personnel that conducted this raid.
The place where we caught them is just 2.5 km far from the Sawai Mansigh sanctuary area. They were regularly killing animals from sanctuary and other adjoining areas for sale as bushmeat. They are also involved in Bhagwat leopard killing.
regards,
dharmendra khandal
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| From Ranthambhore |
FEBRUARY 2009
Dear Aditya,
Thank you for the interest shown about the Madhya Pradesh poachers. I am sending my draft for your blog. you can edit language and grammar but try to keep it as it is.
According to my informers, at least 15 Mogyas tribal’s have congregated around Ranthambhore.
Each one of them has the experience to poach tigers in Ranthambhore. They may be not lead the gang but they belonged to some small or organized tiger poaching gang.
1. Battilal (we caught this guy)
2. Mukesh (already wanted in police for tiger killing)
3. Roop Singh (wanted in police for tiger killing)
4. Rai singh (again having experience of tiger poaching around Uliana and Chhan)
5. Kalwa
6. Suresh s/o Alamji
7. Debi
8. Mangal
9. 10 to 15 unknown migrant guys from the central Indian state of Madhya Pradesh.
Why they are dangerous?
1. becoz they are having experience to poach tigers in Ranthmabhore.
2. some of them are still wanted in tiger poaching case
3. they are purely nomadic not like our semi nomads Rajasthani Mogyas.
4. they have 2-3 identities and are not listed by any state agency. I mean they have no ration card, voter card or BPL cards etc – for all purpose they do not exist.
5. very agile and swift people
6. few bad Mogyas stated their job again like Jugraj, Lodiya and Laxman. These are people who have been caught and convicted earlier.
7. Tiger watch (the organization that I work for) has been handling women and kids of Mogyas, but we could not provide any alternative jobs to men of Mogya community. If Field Director or any state agency is ready to work with Tiger Watch we can change some Mogyas in nature trekker guide etc
But very frankly the officials of the Forest Department are spending more time to shut down Tiger watch efforts instead of supporting or guiding to us.
Now 3-4 topics that should be debated and explaination should be called for from the Forest Department:
1. Construction of undesirable water bodies in side park like entire kachida area is now been made into a wetland type habitat.
2. Construction and erection of guard post or tent near water holes like in bakola, lakarda, berda, etc
3. They are wasting more time in tourism instead of forest department work.
Regards,
dharmendra khandal
Missing tiger found
There are reports in the local and national newspaper that a male tiger – officially known as T 3 (picture below – taken before he was radio collared) – has been reported missing from the Ranthambhore national park for over two months. This tiger (we call him Bahadur or Bunty) is the male cub of Machali (Ranthambhore’s best known tigress) from her previous litter. He is about 4 years old and use to be found in the heart of the park between the lakes and a place called Lakkarda (with in the bigger circle in the map below).
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| From Ranthambhore |
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T 3 was one of the first tigers of Ranthambhore to be radio collared by the Wildlife Institute of India. However, there was some defect in the transmitter in his radio collar and it never really worked properly.
Somewhere in the second half of October he moved of this area and was not seen since then. The Forest guards did try for many days to track him down but had little success. Recently it came out in the newspapers that this tiger is missing. We have no idea why he decided to change his territory.
In the middle of November we had Daniel and Daniella Free (our regular guests from UK) staying with us. On the 17th of November 2008 they had gone for a safari on zone number 5 that goes right across the park. In the early afternoon they spotted a male tiger (without a radio collar) near the Thumka chowki (smaller circle in the map above). Their guide (Vijay Singh) told me that they had seen a young and confident male crossing the forest track and that the male had blood marks on his chest, probably from eating a kill. At that time we were sure that it was not T 3 that they saw because they had seen a tiger without a radio collar.
Daniella was generous enough to give me two pictures of this male (pictures below) and just yesterday I got down to match those two images with the other pictures that I have. And guess what it turned out to be T 3 without the collar. I immediately called up the forest authorities and informed them. The Deputy Field Director came over to the shack that we call our office and took a copy of the images. Even he took a long time to believe that this male had somehow managed to get rid of the ugly collar around his neck.
Three cheers for T 3 without the collar.
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| From Ranthambhore |
The tourism conundrum - An insider responds
Here is an article that I wrote for the Sanctuary magazine:
A few weeks ago, I received a scathing response from a ‘tiger activist’ friend to an article I had posted online about the conservation value of tourism. After blasting my views, he finally stated that what tigers really need is “isolation from the forest department, researchers, scientists, locals, tribals, conservationists, hoteliers and tourists.” While it sounds like the perfect solution to all our problems, we do not live a perfect world. It would be ideal if our biodiversity would be protected for its intrinsic natural value rather than economic benefits but years of petitions and campaigns have still not translated into concrete results, and much of the public is still distanced from conservation. It is high time we consider a broader triple bottom line – market, environment and society. The reality is that tourism is here to stay, whether we like it or not. But the positive aspect of tourism is that it can be made into a winning formula, if we really want it to be, and use it for the advantage of wildlife.
Green bucks
There are few pristine wilderness habitats left in India and the majority of them are surrounded by human habitation. Ranthambhore – a prime tiger reserve – has been described as “an ecological island surrounded by overgrazed pastures and agricultural fields” in the Management Plan of the reserve. Nearly 100 villages surround Ranthambhore National Park and these villagers depend on the park’s resources for their livelihood – fodder for cattle, fuel-wood for their kitchens and minor forest produce for sale. The farmers who own land around the reserve use every possible means to keep wildlife off their fields, including hiring poachers to kill them. The only pro-biodiversity economic activity around Ranthambhore (and most of the Protected Areas in India) is tourism.
Traditionally, the forest department and most conservationists “have seen tourism as a necessary evil with zero conservation value.” Many forest officers and old school conservationists have accused me of the ultimate wildlife crime — of “making money from wildlife.” My answer always remains that I do not make money out of wildlife, — poachers do that. Yes, I make a living but my work supports and sustains the park, its wildlife conservancies, buffer zones and local communities.
Tourism is the only economic activity that values wildlife habitats as ‘economic zones’ and is the only ‘industry’ that pays for biodiverse, standing forests. Tourism is also a very effective anti-poaching unit in many Protected Areas in India, possibly the most effective given the poor track record of patrolling. Consider how few patrolling vehicles we have in most tiger reserves and compare this to the large number of tourist vehicles plying through the tourism zone. Little wonder the tourism zones seem to harbour the highest tiger densities. Dr. Raghu Chundawhat, an imminent tiger scientist, has stated on record that the Tala zone of the Bandhavgarh Tiger Reserve in Madhya Pradesh held a greater density of wild tigers (by far the highest in the world) than he had ever believed possible in such a small area. Of course, the Tala range also happens to support one of the highest tourist densities out of all our tiger reserves.
Tourism, to a large extent, was responsible for the revitalisation of African wildlife. In a developing country like South Africa, wilderness tourism generates US$12 per acre per annum, while agricultural land yields just US$3 per acre. Furthermore its national parks are virtually financed by tourism revenues. Mountain gorillas ‘earn’ $200,000 per annum in permit fees alone Bwindi Impenetrable Forest in Uganda, and the indirect revenue is probably 30 times greater. Living Kenyan elephants will help bring in $1,000,000 in tourism revenue in their lifetimes, while a local poacher will earn less than $300 for the value of elephant ivory.
Let’s move to tigers. What is a tiger worth? The tourism zone of the Ranthambhore Tiger Reserve, which has around 20 tigers, contributes over Rs. one billion – directly and indirectly – to the Indian economy, every year. Of course we have a problem here. Over 40 per cent of this amount never reaches anyone in Ranthambhore and barely three per cent actually goes to the park.
A different kind of wildlife tourism
Sanctuary readers hardly need to be informed that “traditional” wildlife conservation practices in India have failed. This is primarily due to the ‘one size fits all’ approach” of wildlife tourism in our country. Travel Operators for Tigers (TOFT) – a campaign for responsible use of wild habitats in India sums this up well: “There is a growing recognition that tourism presently available within tiger reserves is often of poor quality in terms of facilities, interpretation and guidance, is ‘one species’ (read tiger) centric, often at loggerheads with park, community and tourism officials and offers little support for local communities.”
We – tourism professionals, including myself – are largely responsible for the mess in which wildlife tourism finds itself in India, but it hardly helps that government’s policies too run counter to what effective and sustainable wildlife tourism needs. Considerable blame must also be apportioned to the unfulfilled promises of major tourism ‘players’ including corporates, travel outfits and hotel chains. Most have adopted a “green” language because that is what travelers now want. But value tourism has not been internalised by them. Wildlife tourism must be built on the premise that it should empower locals, increase awareness and contribute to wildlife conservation.
Ranthambhore is an excellent example of what is wrong with wildlife tourism in India. Spread across nearly 300 sq. km. (50 per cent of which is a tourism zone, which supports most of the park’s tigers), Ranthambhore is encircled by almost 100 villages and three small towns. Yet only five villages and two towns have somehow cornered 90 per cent of all the tourism revenue from this destination. A small ‘cartel’ of hotels, local travel agents, suppliers, shop owners and transporters are earning money, the rest get nothing. Why should they support the park?
Yes, tourism provides some employment to locals, these are ridiculously low-paying jobs. There is more. Of the over 100 guides, 80 per cent have little wildlife knowledge or real training. The hotels are all located along on a short strip between Sawai Madhopur town and the sole entry point to the park, thus concentrating tourism benefits to a tiny fragment of the population.
Alternative tourist options such as hiking, birding and camping are discouraged even outside the park. The entry fees to the park are so low as to constitute a mere five per cent of the budget of most tourists. Meanwhile, the national park is woefully short of funds. To add insult to injury, as of now not a rupee from the entry fees goes towards conserving the park, though technically 75 per cent of these fees are labeled ‘eco development surcharge’.
The list of contradictions and problems is endless and could possibly be applied to almost any Protected Areas (PAs) in India. This is why “a dead tiger is worth more to the local villager than a live one.”
The way forward
Julian Mathews founder of the TOFT campaign, suggests that wildlife tourism in India needs to “provide a much more rewarding holiday experience for visitors, raise the quality of life of local communities, and protect the natural environment.”
So how do we achieve this? To make wildlife tourism an effective conservation tool in India we – conservationists, the government and tourism professionals – must change our own archaic thought processes regarding both tourism and conservation. There are no magical solutions but there are a few things that we can do. Almost all PAs have core zones, which are out of bound for tourists and a buffer area where tourism is permitted. The density of wildlife is much higher in the tourism zone and the core area is rarely monitored. Predictably, most wildlife offences including poaching, cattle grazing and woodcutting take place in the core zone, where offenders have a free run. In Ranthambhore, the poaching incidents that took place between 2003 and 2005 only came to light because poachers started targeting tigers in the tourism zone, after they had wiped out tigers from the inaccessible core. Field biologists and forest officers need to work together to come up with a plan that suggests how tourism in core areas can be turned into a monitoring exercise for a few days each month. The revenue generated could pay for 24×7 patrolling, 365 days a year. This does not mean that the core zone be turned into a ‘free for all’ because wild animals do need the solitude that is often denied when noisy vehicles and tourists enter. But surely it is time now for us to work out sensible ‘tourist carrying capacities’ for park? And no, the current carrying capacity analysis is not going to cut it. Often this constitutes a simplistic formula park managers come up with to arrive at figures stipulated by ‘higher ups’. So we accept 90 vehicles a day as the suggested carrying capacity of the Tala range in Bandhavgarh, while this actually exceeds the carrying capacity of the entire Ranthambhore tourism zone, which is three times the size of the Tala range.
We need to get real about wildlife tourism. Visitors are able and willing to pay much more. In some parks, the fee is even lower than the price of bottled water in a mid-range hotel. And there is nothing wrong with charging special-interest tourists including photographers and birdwatchers more for the privilege of longer, (carefully) supervised excursions and permissions to use hides, or guard outposts.
We should explore the idea of developing a tourism buffer within the forest buffer area. In most parks, for instance, agricultural fields begin right where the forest ends, leading to human-wildlife conflict. If hotels in wildlife areas were only permitted to set up facilities in harmony with the land on just two per cent of their land holdings, they could be persuaded to manage the rest of their land holding with the same strict rules that are implemented within the national park. If this were done, within a few short years, we would have a high biodiversity tourism buffer on the periphery of most parks. This would not only add to the forest area but reduce the tourist pressures at today’s over-crowded entry points. And, of course, ‘tourist cash’ would automatically reach locals.
So will we see a situation where degraded wildlife habitats next to PAs are leased out to tourism facilities, rather than to paper mills around Tadoba? Or land ‘developers’ and industrialists around Kanha, Bandhavgarh, Periyar, Bandipur and Keoladeo? I hope so, because if this is not done, I believe the noose around the PA network can only tighten, till it throttles the biodiversity that brings in the tourists.
The forest department controls over one-fifth of India’s total land area and the vast majority of these lands are going from bad to worse. The department lacks the resources to revive and nurture them. Leasing them out on very strict terms for wildlife tourism might just be the most effective, least risky way to revive these degraded forests. In the process, according to Sanctuary, local communities and the forest department itself could legitimately earn a sizeable amount from the carbon trading regimes that are currently not able to do much to actually help counter climate change.
The bottom line? Forest and Tourism Departments, the tourism industry itself and local communities need to recognise the benefits of working together on systems and solutions that restore health to our wildernesses. The economic and the ecological health of our nation will improve, poaching will come down and the more popular parks, which are hotbeds of local conflict, could see a wonderful transformation with locals community leaders and tourism professionals taking on the role of ‘wildlife activists’ in India.
The gentleman who is busy photographing the tiger from the ground (which is strictly forbidden in Indian Tiger Reserves), in the above picture, was the Deputy Director of the Kanha Tiger Reserve in Central India. So much for responsible behaviour.
Update from Ranthambhore
It’s been a long time since I posted on the blog. I was on a long vacation and got back to Ranthambhore about 3 weeks ago and since then I have been busy trying to make a living. Yes some of us have to do that. Here are some updates from Ranthambhore:
1. The Park reopened to visitors on the 1st of October after being shut for three moths of monsoons. This year the monsoon rains were spectacular. The best that I have seen and all the waterholes in the park are overflowing. The park is lush green and there should be no major water shortages in the dry summer months.
2. The cubs of the Guda tigress that was found dead in September are still alive and kicking. They have been killing deer fawns and are apparently doing well. A true miracle. They are just about 10 months old – one male and one female – and have been taking care of each other. More about this in a later post.
3. In the Sultanpur area of the park (southern part of the national park) a tigress has given birth to two cubs. They were probably born somewhere in the late summers and have been seen by a number of visitors in the last three weeks.
4. The Forest Department has come out with a new policy to govern tourism, which is a total disaster. This policy is neither good for tourism nor for conservation and has ended up making Ranthambhore the “most visitor unfriendly park in India.” Basically it has made life extremely tough for people like me who make a living out of the visitors who come to see the park.
5. I learnt something really amazing yesterday. The Rajasthan Forest Department has started an “official inquiry” into my blog. A senior Forest Officer who is based in Jaipur is the enquiry officer. Apparently some people took some print out of this blog (mainly of some stuff that I had posted when tiger poaching was at its peak in Ranthambhore – 2004 or so) and sent them as a “complaint” to the Forest Department in Jaipur. The Forest Department, for obvious reason went ballistic and have now launched an enquiry on how I could post such stuff. . What really upset me is that they took three years to know about something that is so public. Just goes to show that no one really reads what I write. 
Tigress found dead in Ranthambhore
Yesterday afternoon (1st September 2008) the carcass of a tigress was found in the Guda area, that lies at the southern end of the Ranthambore national park. This tigress was known as the Guda female (see image below) and was over 10 years old – an old age for wild tigers – and had two cubs that would slightly younger than a year in age. The cubs are missing and even as I write this the forest department officials are trying their hardest to find the two cubs.
According to the forest department sources the carcass of this tigress was found in the early afternoon yesterday in a highly decomposed state. She was probably dead for over two days. The forest department officials cremated the body after conducting an autopsy. The autopsy report is yet to be released and probably never will be, at least the likes of me will never see it.
It is being made out by official sources (and the national media has really lapped it up) that she died in a “territorial fight” with another tiger. The Press Trust of India (PTI) newline says “Rise in Tiger population in Rajasthan’s Ranthambore Sanctuary seems to have given rise to “territory wars” among the predators…………………….. the Ranthambore national park, spread over 400 sq km is busting with robust tiger population. As per a 2007 census, the number of stripped animals have increased from 25 in 2005 to 32 last year. The figure excludes cubs, whose number is estimated to be around 14.”
I would like to clarify the following:
1. The Ranthambhore national park is spread over an area of 282 square kilometers and not 400, as PTI (India’s leading new agency claims – come on guys get your facts right).
2. The official census data of 2005 claimed 26 tigers in Ranthambhore and not 25. The real figure at that time was 13 adults and 5 cubs (all below the age of 6 months).
3. The census figures for last year were 32 (released early last year) and this census was the most exhaustive one ever undertaken. This figure of 32 included all the cubs. After these figures were released 8 more cubs were born and two of these (the cubs of the Guda tigress) are missing.
4. The tiger numbers have definitely increased in Ranthambhore, in fact they bounced back from a near calamity. But Ranthambhore is not (by any standard) “busting” with tigers. Ranthambhore national park and the two adjoining areas where the tigers spread to (the Sawai Man Singh sanctuary and the Sawai Madhopur sanctuary” can easily accommodate over 40 adult tigers. This was the number that existed in 2001. Right now there are about 22 (I may be off by 10% plus or minus) adults and that is not “busting” at all.
Rajasthan’s leading regional Hindi newspaper – Rajasthan Patrika – also adds that the forest department is not ruling out death due to poisoning and had sent the viscera for investigation into this angle. This is really interesting.
The area around Guda and further south (outside the national park – where there is little protection for wild life) of it is the beginning of the “Ranthambhore tiger death zone” – I mean that’s where 15 or more tiger have disappeared in the last 4 years. There are a few “forest unfriendly” villages in that area and few large settlements of former hunting gathering tribes (Mogiyas, Bagariyas and Kanjar).
The Guda tigress shares her area with a few villages. Her territory overlaps with that of two male tigers – one is her son from the last litter and the other is the father of her new litter (the two cubs who are missing right now). It is highly unlikely that she was killed in a fight with one of these two tigers. Her present mate would not fight her and her son dare not.
I don’t know how she died but I would bet my cameras (the most precious possession that I have) that it was not because of a territorial fight.
Ranthambhore – Sariska and tiger shuttle – Part II
……….About a year ago the Rajasthan Forest Department declared that they would relocate tigers from Ranthambhore to Sariska to right the wrong. When they fist came out with this plan almost everyone (including me) laughed at it. Most people (not me this time) had declared Sariska as history. A few months after it came out in the news that there were no tigers in Sariska – four of us – Dr. Dharmendra Khandal (Field Biologist of Tiger Watch), Dr. Amit Kotia (a fine botanist), Juhi Chaudhry (the then co-coordinator Kids for Tigers) and I – had gone to Sariska for a few days. At that time the Project Tiger and the Government of Rajasthan were still denying that tiger had been wiped out from Sariska. We had some great wildlife moments there. The habitat was amazing but the tigers were missing. Just a few weeks after we came back they government finally conceded that there were no tiger left in Sariska.
This was a big blow to the Rajasthan Forest Department and the Project Tiger, in fact, to the entire conservation movement in India. But nothing much changed. The budgets, priorities, procedures and staff stayed the same. But a handful of officers of the Rajasthan Forest Department and the Rajasthan police worked their heart out. The protection level went up dramatically. A number of poachers were apprehended and suddenly the poaching community (mainly members of the Mogiya and Bawaria hunting gathering tribes) was on the run. A convicted tiger poacher from Ranthambhore – Devi Singh Mogiya – told us this, on camera.
Dara male - the first tiger to be shifted from Ranthambore to sariska
The Mogiyas and Bawarias are off shoots of the larger Pardhi tribe. The general public opinion is that these people are extremely dangerous, very secretive and totally ruthless. They maybe ruthless for wildlife but they are really scared of any kind authority. They may be secretive but at the local level I was common knowledge that they were poaching big time. It is just that no one really bothered about them, till Sariska happened.
Dara male - the first tiger to be shifted from Ranthambore to sariska
Once the protection level increased tiger numbers in Ranthambore gradually recovered. In May 2005 the Rajasthan State Empowered Committee had declared that there were 26 tigers in Ranthambhore, which was untrue. At that time there were only 18 tigers – 13 adults and 5 cubs. Till a month or so ago there were 23 adults (one of the earlier 18 – Yuvraj - a young male was killed by Mogiyas somewhere in the end of November and six newer cubs had grown up), 6 sub adults and 8 young cubs. I could be wrong here by one or two but that would be about it.
There were recent media reports that the forest authorities had sighted 14 cubs (below the age of 4 months) during the hot summer months of 2008. This was hogwash. There are right now 8 cubs (in four different families) and not 14. And out of these 8 only 4 had been positively till the end of May. I don’t know how this figure of 14 came up. Anyways these figures are not really important. What is more relevant is that the population is on the recovery mode. Ranthambhore is not overflowing with tigers (as it is made out to be) but it is definitely on a rapid recovery mode.
By the beginning of this year the relocation plan became very serious. A lot of our “cocktail party” conservationists were dead against the plan. A few (that included me) were skeptical about it (in fact till a month ago I use to think that the Forest Department may not finally have the nerve to pull it off) but were not against it in principle. This was the only idea if Sariska had to be revived as a tiger reserve. The habitat and prey was there in Sariska but the tiger was missing. The experiment had to be tried out, even if it failed.
I have not been to Sariska in the last 6 months but the news that I was getting was that a few, actually five, enclosures – where the tigers would be released as soon as they reach Sariska. Once the tigers get over their “trauma” of the journey, they would be released.
Bachhi - the first tigress to be shfted to Sariska from ranthambore
By the second week of May most parts of the park were closed for tourists. The only part that was left open was the area of the lakes and the part from the lakes to a forest guard post called Guda (towards the southern end of the Ranthambore national park). The tourists were not complaining because this is one of the most popular part of the national park. Monitoring of tigers in the closed part of the park was intensified and some tigers were short listed for relocation. By the middle of June a few of the shortlisted tigers were radio collared, besides the three that had been radio collared some months ago.
Bachhi - the first tigress to be shfted to Sariska from ranthambore
The tigers that were shortlisted were young tigers that had separated from their mothers about a year or so ago. A tiger of that age group would have just about established (particularly females) their territories in Ranthambhore but would not have been totally entrenched there. To move even one tiger, four or five would have to be identified so that they would be able to surely find one of them to tranquilize a few hours before they were to be air lifted.
The plan was to make a stopgap helipad inside the Ranthambore national park, where an Indian air force helicopter could land. Experts from the Wildlife Institute of India would tranquilize one of the identified tigers, put them in a covered cage, load this cage on the helicopter and fly them to Sariska, where they would be released inside the enclosures. Sounds easy but it is very difficult to pull off.
In late 2007, three tigers were radio collared in Ranthambore for monitoring purpose. When this was done, we suddenly realized that the Forest Department was serious about shifting tigers to Sariska. One of these three tigers – a male that is slightly over 3 years old and is known as the Darra male or T 10 – was the first tiger that was the first tiger to be relocated to Sariska. The helicopter arrived in Ranthambhore on the evening of the 28th of June. The idea was to relocate the first (of the five – 2 males and 3 females) tiger on the morning of the 29th. It almost did not work out because it was raining heavily on the 29th morning. The tiger (Darra male) was located and the entire forest team was waiting for the rains to stop. Slightly after 1000 hours or so the rain stopped, the tiger was tranquilized, put in the cage and airlifted. It was real touch and go. The tiger recovered from the tranquilizing dose in midair but was still too dazed to move around. They managed to land him in Sariska and move the cage to one of the enclosures. The top brass of Rajasthan Forest Department was in the helicopter with the tiger.
A forest officer told me that the moment they opened the gate of the cage, the tiger almost charged out of it and hid behind some bushes in the enclosure. They had left a bait for him in the enclosure, which he killed a few hours after being released but did not eat till much later.
On the 6th of July a tigress, known here as Bachhi (or daughter – because she is the daughter of a Ranthambhore most famous tigress – Machali – from the last litter) was similarly moved. This time the entire operation went like clockwork. Bachhi was my favorite, an absolute beauty, and I have some amazing pictures of her. What was interesting is that these two were territorial neighbors and had mated about a month ago. Both of them are still very young so the mating may not be fruitful but they would be surely recognizing each other’s scent. A day after Bachhi reached Sariska, the Darra male was released from his enclosure. He is now free to establish his domain. The forest department has been cleared the first big hurdle but there is still a big hill to climb. I am sure they will climb it.
In the map pasted below Bachhi’s territory is marked in red, while the Darra male’s territory is marked out in black. Hope they do well.
Map of Ranthambore
Hats off to officers like R N Mehrotra (Chief Wildlife Warden, Rajasthan), R S Shekhawat (Deputy Field Director, Ranthambhore national park), R S Somashekhar (DFO Sariska) and their supporting staff. You pulled out the first two rabbits out of the hat. Congrats.