Mailbag

Dwindling wild life I

Sir,
Year after year, we celebrate wild life protection week in the Ist week of Oct. A lot is said and debated upon wild life in various seminars and symposia about various measures being taken for protection of wild life. This looks like a ritual and mere publicity as the wild life goes on dwindling continuously. Thus, the money spent on various wild life protection schemes is going as a waste because root cause of annihilation of wild life is not attended to i.e saving of its Habitat. A retired Principal Conservator of Karnataka has said "the wild life is not destroyed by hunting but by destruction of its habitat. No body is bothered about thousands of cattle and goats grazing in the sanctuaries and games reserve.'' This clearly implies that unless we rehabilitate the degraded forests which are natural habitat of wild life, no protection and improvement is possible although we may spent billions. The money being spent presently is becoming infructuous.

At present, the health of forests is going from bad to worse every year. The officials responsible for protection are actively conniving in the destruction of forests. Therefore, it is time to find out what actually has happened to our forests during the last 30 years? This can be done by asking some voluntary Organisations or University students to conduct some sample surveys in some selected forest areas of each forest Division/Game sanctuary. The point of references may be as follows:

i) Increase in population adjoining forests and whether this has taken place as a result of Forest/Revenue lands allotted to the new dwellers with the connivance of the officials.

ii) The increase in number of cattle, goats in the area dependent on forest fodder.

iii) Extent of decrease in forest area as well as the decrease in density of trees and bushes.

iv) The effect of forest protection measures taken during the last 30 years. Whether the money spent has helped in any improvement in the regeneration of forests?

v) Measures requried to be taken so that ecological balance is not disturbed due to developmental activities and how to minimise the pressure of human and cattle on the forests.

After analysing critically reports on the above points, some practical and pragmatic measures may be devised to protect the forests from further degeneration. The wild life will automatically flourish and reproduce in its natural habitat.

As a short term measure, some selected forest areas say about 10 sq. kms at different locations where the human and domestic animal interference is minimum, may be fenced and entrusted to some volunteer wlid life enthusiasts for their up-keep who will associate the locals for proper watch and word as well as protection of these areas. Very encouraging results in revival of different faunas and floras shall be noticed in these areas in a span of less than 5 years.
Yours etc........
M.S. Jamwal,
Sainik Colony, Jammu

Dwindling wild life II

Sir,
The old laws of hunting are dead. Although the States started banning hunting in the 80's but it is just as common today as before 50's or 60's. The wild life protection Act, 1972 promises from one to six years in prison and invites upto seven years punishment for shooting & cooking of meat of endangered species respectively. It is irony of the fact that after enactment of such acts, the professional shikaris went almost out of business, fearing punishment and fine, but celebrity hunting is on. The list includes top industrialists, politicians, bureaucrats, foreign diplomats, senior defence officials and, of course, our Bollywood actors, as in the recent past. And because of their status in the society, cases are'nt registered against them. The new breed of hunters have power and enjoy misusing it. The wild life department in Punjab identifies senior police officials as new hunters. No body in staff dare to arrest or go against them.

Besides, the status and machismo the other reason for hunting is meat. Farmhouses and hotels have sprung up around the wild life sanctuaries and National parks. There is no law to restrict sale of land around the parks. As Ashok Kumar of Wild Life Protection Society of India puts it "people taunt me at Delhi parties, come home and I'll serve you venison.'' Across the India, the wild life species are dying due to neglect and apathy of human beings. Almost near to extinction are:-

Nilgiri Thar, Swamp deer, Great Indian Bustard, Hungul

On the night of Sept. 26, the Indian film Industry's emerging star Salman Khan alongwith Saif Ali, Satish Shah, Neelam, Tabu and Sonali went on with a blunder at a wrong place, Barad village (Jodhpur) where Bishnois have sacred tradition of protecting the wild life. It is alleged that he killed two Chinkara's. On October, 1, two Black bucks were shot. Both Chinkara and blackbucks figure in endangered list of species.

The problem which results in such incidents lies in underpaid and overworked forest guards, whom sometimes have to cover 50 sq. km of forest area and that too on bicycles. The environment and Forest Ministry gets less than 1 percent of GDP out of which less than 4 percent goes to forests. The other major problem is the impotency of law in dealing with such cases especially when they are concerned with individuals having status and power. Faults by average person, howsoever big, do not affect us. We need big names to be attached with faults to make it a news worth listening. Local people may be doing a hell amount of crimes by killing endangered species but we need Salman Khan to awaken us against such crimes. Hopefully the incident might bring a solution or the wild life will ever fall prey to greed of mankind. Let's pledge to save nature to save ourselves and future generations.

Yours etc......
Vikram Jeet Singh
Jammu.