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Indian government to set up more tiger reserves

16/Sep/2006: With the population of the Royal Bengal Tigers plummeting in India, the government has decided to setup new reserves to protect this wonderful creature in the wild.

With the addition of new reserves, the total number of tiger reserves in India will go up from 28 to 36. The eight new reserves would protect an estimated 250 tigers. The new reserves will be setup at Kaziranga in Assam, Anamalai – Parambikulam on the border of Tamil Nadu and Kerala, Udanti and Sita Nadi sanctuary in Chhattisgarh and the Sakosia wildlife sanctuary in Orissa.

Last year the tiger population in India was almost wiped out, with poaching and habitat loss driving the population to near extinction. It required the personal intervention of the Indian Prime Minister Dr. Manmohan Singh, to give a new life to ‘Project Tiger’ (a wildlife conservation project launched in 1973, to protect the royal Bengal tigers in India), when the crisis spiraled out of control.

A few conservationists in India feel that the setting up of new tiger reserves would only stretch the already strained resources. Valmik Thapar, a conservationist, questions the government’s intentions in bringing well-protected sanctuaries under the ‘Project Tiger’ program. He feels that the government’s decision to setup new tiger reserves in the country is merely a move to dilute the criticisms on the government, on its inability to prevent poaching of tigers.

In spite of the efforts taken by the government, tigers are continued to be poached in this country, with one estimate saying that one tiger is poached every day in India. Most of the 3,000 tigers left in the wild in this country are facing an uncertain future with poaching and habitat loss threatening their very existence.

A.K.Siva

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