Two wildlife rescue centres being built in Uttarakhand

New Delhi, August 17: In an initiative to protect the state’s at-risk wildlife, Uttarakhand has started work on building two rescue centres for leopards and tusker elephants — animals most vulnerable to poaching and “revenge” killings caused due to human-animal conflict situations. “The centres will be located in Almora and Haridwar, and though they will be for all animals the focus will be on these two species,” says Uttarakhand Chief Wildlife Warden Srikant Chandola.

“We have the maximum number of human-leopard conflict situations here,” confirms Chandola. “Leopards are the only big cats that often go near humans and then become prone to revenge killings. Villagers are known to poison them,” he says, adding that a man-eating leopard recently killed a young girl in Devnagar.

In addition, poachers are also driven to target these spotted animals with ‘truant’ ones being most at risk because of their visibility — since a single leopard skin can be sold for as much as Rs 80,000. Last Wednesday, the Wildlife Crime Control Bureau in a joint operation with the Uttarakhand Special Task Force seized three fresh leopard skins in Dehradun district and as many as 15 fresh leopard skins have been seized from Uttarakhand, and to a lesser extent, neighbouring Uttar Pradesh since July 22.

Unattached male tuskers too, have been involved in human-animal conflicts, since they can become dangerous during their ‘musth’ (heat) period and subject to attacks by frightened villagers. “We have the best sex ratio of elephants in the country. To maintain this it is imperative to safeguard them at this time, since people often tend to shoot them. We plan to capture the elephants and keep them at the rescue centre if they create problems. They can later be released,” Chandola says.

Incidentally, the Uttarakhand Forest Department is now working on creating an anti-poaching strategy. Since most leopards are poached from less accessible higher reaches of the state, especially in Dehradun, villagers will be employed as contact persons to facilitate patrolling. The state is also looking at linking up with the Wildlife Crime Control Bureau for intelligence networking, conducting raids, and setting up of a legal cell to ensure convictions.

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