Wildlife trafficking is the fourth largest transnational crime after arms, drugs, and human trafficking as per United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime. When it comes to South Asia, India is considered as the source country for the wild species and its body parts. The World WISE database shows 1000 to 62,000 seizures reported by India from 2004 to 2015. The Wildlife (Protection Act), 1972 is the primary legislation that protects the species listed under Schedule I to IV of … Read More
Hunting Festivals of West Bengal — An Untold Story of Wildlife Massacre
Ritualistic Hunting — The Silent Wildlife Killer of West Bengal
HEAL has been documenting South Bengal’s hunting festivals since 2016 and working with enforcement authorities to put an end to this indiscriminate mass killing of endangered wildlife.
This is the earlier documentation of their work on CI.
All of us are acutely aware of the hunting of megafauna connected with the multi-billion dollar illegal wildlife trade. Many of us also know of the problem of hunting that persists in the … Read More
India’s Protected Area (PA) Network
Here is a short primer on Protected Areas in India.
What is a Protected Area (PA)?
PAs in India comprise National Parks, Sanctuaries, Conservation / Community Reserves and Tiger Reserves. It does not include Reserved Forests.
Protected Area (PA) has been defined in the Wildlife (Protection) Act, 1972 (WLPA). Section 2(24A) says: “Protected Area” means a National Park, Sanctuary, Conservation / Community Reserve. These are notified under Chapter IV of the WLPA titled “Protected Areas”.
A Tiger Reserve on the … Read More
Q: I am a law student and want to purchase a legal commentary on the Wildlife Protection Act 1972. Unfortunately I am not able to find it anywhere. Law book store owners state that there no such detailed commentaries available. Can you help?
Answer from the CI Team:
Thank you for your interest. This book would be really helpful for a commentary on the WLPA : Wildlife Law for Rangers.
It is a practical guide to the effective implementation of the Wild Life (Protection) Act, 1972 (WLPA). Prosecution of offenders requires Forest Officers to also have a reasonable understanding of the Code of Criminal Procedure, 1973 (CrPC) which is explained in the book.
You can buy the book on Amazon India here… Read More
Religious Festivals Inside Protected Areas
CI recently received this very pertinent question (in our ‘Ask CI’ section) from Suraj Kumaar of Coimbatore: “I would like to know what kind of rights for worship are provided to tribals and forest dwellers (villagers) inside PAs? We have been recording the temple festivals inside Sathyamangalam Wildlife Sanctuary over the last two years and the situation is one of absolute mayhem. Between 70,000 to 1,50,000 visitors, over 700 buses, trucks visit two temples deep inside the sanctuary. One temple, … Read More
Illegal Sand Mining, Shimsha River, Karnataka
This photographer made this image of illegal sand mining activities going on the Shimsha river bed near Kokkare Bellur (see location below). This could destroy the sanctuary for the Spot-billed Pelicans and Painted Storks which depend on the fish from this river.
This image of sand mining in the Cauvery river captures the norm rather than the exception: across the length of the river, and its tributaries (like Shimsha), sand is being gouged out at a pace that is hundreds … Read More
Action To Be Taken After Detection Of Tiger Mortality
Background
On 21st December, 2011, an adult tiger was found dead at a place called Chekkadi in Tirunelli Village just two kilometers from the boundary of Wayanad Sanctuary in Kerala. The tiger was caught in a strong wire snare skillfully laid between two trees just beyond a thick hedge. Preliminary investigations by the Forest department have revealed that the land belongs to one Beerabahu a resident of Apparapara Village who is absconding. A case has been registered and investigations are … Read More
The Six Percent Solution — a New Recipe for Saving Wild Tigers
21 leading conservation biologists from across the world have proposed that since it might be far too expensive and far too difficult to save all wild tigers, we should focus a major part of our efforts and expenditure on 42 selected sites that show the greatest promise. Here’s CI’s distilled version of the original paper titled Bringing the tiger back from the brink – The six percent solution.
Current approaches to tiger conservation have not succeeded in slowing the decline … Read More
Tiger Killed By Wire Snare, Wayanad, Kerala
On 21st December, 2011, an adult tiger was found dead at a place called Chekkadi in Tirunelli Village, just two kilometres from the boundary of Wayanad Sanctuary in Kerala. The tiger was caught in a strong wire snare skillfully laid between two trees just beyond a thick hedge. A case has been registered and investigations are underway. Conservation India carried a note on the ‘Legal Aspects of Tiger Mortality’ along with a picture sourced from local sources. This picture was … Read More
‘Gajah’: The Report of the Elephant Task Force
A major report on securing the future for the Elephant in India was today submitted to the Minister of Environment & Forests. The report lays out a comprehensive action agenda for protecting elephants in the wild and in captivity, and for addressing human-elephant conflict. The Minister welcomed the Report and promised speedy implementation of the major recommendations.
The Executive Summary is posted here. The full report can be downloaded from the MOEF website here.
Executive Summary
Securing a future … Read More
Supreme Court Calls for New Standards for Endangered Species Conservation
A slightly different version of this article appeared in the Hindu dated May 7, 2013.
The recent Supreme Court judgment on lions (Centre for Environmental Law WWF-1 v. Union of India and others, Supreme Court, 2013) has called for completely new standards for endangered species conservation to be set in the country. It has asked for lions to be re-introduced to Madhya Pradesh (Intervention Application 100, Biodiversity Conservation Trust of India through Faiyaz Khudsar in writ petition 337, 1995). It … Read More
Bullfrogs in a Bucket
This image highlights the serious problem of Indian Bullfrog (Hoplobatrachus tigerinus) poaching during the monsoon. We came across a paddy farmer near Jog falls, Mavingundi, Karnataka, who had collected nearly 30 bullfrogs and kept them in a bucket waiting to hand them over to a guy from Goa who was supposed to come and collect the frogs for the Goan Bar/Restaurant market. They are sold as ‘Jumping chicken’ there. We immediately rescued and released them plus reported the poacher to … Read More
Urgent Campaign for a Credible National Board for Wildlife — Act Now!
Most urgent! Write to the Minister of Environment & Forests urging him to constitute a CREDIBLE National Board for Wildlife. The few minutes you spend on this could make a huge difference to India’s precious protected areas. Act now!
Background
All development projects, such as roads, dams, mines, power plants etc. that are proposed in or within 10 kms of a Sanctuary or National Park have to be examined and cleared by the National Board for Wildlife (NBWL), a Statutory … Read More
Important convictions in wildlife cases in Uttarakhand
In the last four days there have been two important convictions in wildlife cases in Uttarakhand – both cases were WPSI assisted seizures – and one important arrest.
The first case involved the seizure of a tiger skin and a full tiger skeleton, one otter skin, a turtle carapace and a steel trap on 30 January 2009 in Fatehpur Range of Ramnagar Forest Division, which adjoins Corbett Tiger Reserve in the nothern state of Uttarakhand. The tiger was killed by … Read More
Pulicat Bird Sanctuary in Grave Danger
Pulicat Bird Sanctuary, spanning northern Tamilnadu and southern Andhra Pradesh is the 2nd largest brackish water ecosystem in India. Hundreds of thousands of migratory waterfowl throng the lake from October to April, including large numbers of Greater and Lesser Flamingos. Efforts are underway through national conservation bodies such as Bombay Natural History Society (BNHS) and Salim Ali Centre for Ornithology and Natural history (SACON) to declare it as a wetland of international importance and obtain for it the status of … Read More
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