Some of the most inaccessible and extremism-affected tiger reserves in India are set to get a booster shot: all the way from Scotland.

The Royal Bank of Scotland (RBS), through its Indian Foundation, is putting in a 1 million pound grant for the rehabilitation of forest based communities around Simlipal, Palamau and Sunderbans, all of which count as the most challenging to manage and inaccessible tiger reserves in India. It these forest-based communities that are illegally dependent on the tiger reserves thus escalating the man-animal conflict and often using their knowledge of the area to connive with poachers.

The poverty of the forest communities on the periphery is just one of the reasons for the difficulty in managing these reserves. This year itself, most of the Forest Department property has been destroyed in Simlipal and Palamau which are both in the grip of Maoist activity. The Sunderbans, home to the Royal Bengal Tiger, were recently ravaged by Cyclone Aila.

Simlipal officials said on condition of anonymity that between March and April, “members of CPI (Maoist) wrecked infrastructure in the reserve, burning down buildings”.

“We are interested in working for environmental conservation and poverty alleviation. We will work with very poor forest-based communities, who because of their dependency are also the most vulnerable. We will be working through NGO’s,” says Sunil Kumar, Head, RBS Foundation India.