Project
Tiger
In 1944 the famous British Indian naturalist
and sportsman, Jim Corbett wrote " A tiger is a large
hearted gentleman with boundless courage and that when he
is exterminated - as exterminated he will be unless public
opinion rallies to his support - India will be the poorer
by having lost the finest of her fauna". Sitting prettily
long- long away from Corbett's time and place in the corporate
2005 his words came haunting our mind as media reports and
Govt. enquiry confirming the large scale massacre of tigers
in the many prestigious Project Tiger areas of India. It is
shocking, as because it was well-accepted fact that if tiger
had to survive he would have only survive in India. It is
also time to go back to the drawing board and to take greater
political and economic initiatives and make people aware of
the life and value of the tiger. Perhaps rightly said by Mr.
S. C. Sharma, the then Addl. Inspector General Of Forests,
Govt. of India in Royal Bengal Tiger in the 21st Century,
a seminar organised by Nature Enviroment and Wild Life Society
(NEWS), in 1999 at Kolkata, "The main challenge with
the conservation, the main agenda of the country and what
you can do, when you can increase the relevance of your project
to the common man. If it does not become a programme for the
villagers living by the side of the tiger project area, I
don't see any hope for survival of tigers".
Alarmed by the steep decline in the world's
tiger population, the International Union for the Conservation
of Nature (IUCN) - now known at the World Conservation Union-
declared the tiger (Panthera tigris tigris) an endangered
species in 1959, and listed it in the Red Data Books. Thanks
to the political initiative taken by late Mrs. Indira Gandhi,
the then Prime Minister of India, the killing of tigers was
prohibited in India in 1970 followed by a ban on all hunting.
A country-wide tiger census in 1972 revealed
that the species count was down to less than 2,000 tigers,
an alarming decline from an estimated 40,000 tigers at the
turn of the present century (Panwar, 1991). Following the
passage of the Wildlife Protection Act in the same year, tiger
protection was taken seriously and on April 1, 1973, Project
Tiger was launched in an initial nine reserves, covering a
total area of 13,723 sq. km, of which 4,242 sq. km were core
areas. Presently there are more than 27 tiger reserves in
different states across the country.
Tiger Project is a comprehensive programme
with an aim to protect the natural ecosystem by mitigating
human-induced limiting factors and to bring it as close to
a natural functioning area as possible. Further emphasis is
laid on the standard of living of the local communities living
in close proximity to the ecosystem to enhance sustainable
development in harmony with the carrying capacity of the natural
habitat.
The Sundarbans Project Tiger initially started
in 1973 with an area of 2,585 sq km distributed over 15 blocks.
This included a core area of 1,330 sq km and a buffer zone
of 1,255 sq km. In addition, 241 sq km are demarcated as a
subsidiary Wilderness zone. The core area of 1,330 sq km is
later declared as a national park. The two main objectives
of the Project are:
1.) To ensure maintenance of a viable
population of the tigers in India for scientific, economic,
aesthetic, cultural and ecological values.
2.) To preserve for all time, areas of such biological importance
as national heritage for the benefit, education and enjoyment
of the people.
Project Tiger Directorate:
A Steering Committee functioning under the chairmanship of
the Prime Minister provides guidelines for the management
of the Tiger Reserves. The non-official members of the Steering
Committee (Project Tiger) and four scientific institutions
nominated by this Steering Committee review the achievements
and status of Project Tiger bi-annually.
The Director of Project Tiger based in New
Delhi is responsible for all the Tiger Projects in the country.
The project Field Director works under direct control of the
Chief Conservator of Forests. Wildlife and ex-officio Chief
Wildlife Warden and the over-all control is exercised by the
principal Chief Conservator of Forests who is at the helm
of forestry administration. Fifty percent of the Project's
funds are provided by the Central Government and the rest
by the State governments.
For the Sundarbans, a field director and
an assistant field director were appointed and supported by
five range officers, 15 foresters with 50 forest guards, 40
boatmen in 10 boats, two motor launches with six people each.
The headquarters was initially located at Gosaba but was later
moved to Canning. Training, monitoring and research programmes
were initiated. Most notable was training on immobilizing
tigers and aspects of radio telemetry.
Number Game:
As a result of the Project, the number of tigers in India
increased from 1800 in 1972 to 4015 in 1986 and from a mere
268 in 9 Project Tiger reserves in 1972 to 1576 in 27 reserves
in 2003. The census figure in the Sundarbans Project Tiger
area was 274 in 2004. All though lots of individual experts
believe, that the actual number of tigers supported by the
Sundarbans tiger reserve may be lower than that indicated
by the census figures and the pug mark census technique needs
serious re-evaluation and alternative techniques should be
tried.
National Park & World Heritage Forest
Site:
The core area of Project Tiger was declared a National Park
in 1989. The pristine wilderness of this area and the important
role it plays in the survival of the Bengal tiger has earned
it recognition as a World Heritage forest site in 1987. It
is India's one of the five Natural Heritage Sites. The other
fours are Kaziranga NP, Manas NP, Keoladeo Sanctuary and Nandadevi
NP.
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