The blood of the tiger

When a poacher killed a tigress in a zoo recently, it was not only one in a series of wildlife offences but also a distressing pointer to the state of affairs in the field of conservation. This is because a tiny forest and wildlife wing, supposed to look after 20 per cent of India in the form of crores worth of biodiversity, is overworked and vulnerable. A solution? Force the elected leadership to create a dedicated ministry of forests and wildlife and reform existing mechanisms, says noted environmentalist VALMIK THAPAR.

WE as the people of this nation should hang our heads in shame. Our hands are stained with the blood of the tigers and leopards that were killed or have died in the last year - Ghaziabad in Uttar Pradesh, December 19, 1999: a truck seized with 50 leopard skins and three tiger skins; Khaga in Uttar Pradesh, January 12, 2000: illegal tanning factory raided and 70 leopard skins, four tiger skins, 221 black buck skins, 18,000 leopard claws and 132 tiger claws seized and 187 kg of tiger and leopard bone found. Haldwani in March 2000 saw two seizures with nearly 100 leopard skins; July 2000, Nandan Kanan zoo in Orissa: 13 tigers die in a few days in grisly circumstances, October 6, ("Wildlife Week"): a poacher kills a tigress in Hyderabad zoo and skins her, ripping away her claws and the horrors will go on. Imagine the state of protection where 300 tigers in cages can be targeted. Let us forget about the fate of our tigers in the wild. God help them. The stench of death engulfs us - claws, skins, teeth, bones, blood, flesh - it all swims around us as the greatest of the great natural treasures of this country is plundered. We have only ourselves to blame because we allow our political leaders to get away with murder, we do not fight back. We watch the orgy of destruction. We do not force action. We have, over the years, turned into passive, silent and impotent spectators. We are "watchers" of the horror story that unfolds in front of our eyes each day. We do not seem to realise that our children and their children will never know what natural India was. Do we even care?

After 25 years of working in this field of forests and wildlife I have never encountered a moment in my life that was so horrific depressing, or so blood curdling. This is our worst crisis and it comes because in 53 years of independence we failed to create effective mechanisms to protect our wilderness or even zoos and captive enclosures. It was only in the early 1980s that we created a Ministry of Environment and Forests from the Ministry of Agriculture. Few have read about the early formation of this ministry and its mandate. Carved out from the agricultural sector, this ministry has a mandate to facilitate use of the land of this country. With a staff of nearly 1,000, this federal mechanism spends 90 per cent of its time dealing with environmental issues. First and foremost on the agenda is the functioning of six "expert" committees that clear projects on environmental grounds. Nearly every private and public sector project comes to this clearing-house - from highways, thermal power, river valley, mines, infrastructure, nuclear power and industry. Every month each committee sits and clears projects. The proponents run away with their clearances and a list of mandatory conditions, that in 90 per cent of the cases are never adhered to. Violators of environmental norms are seldom punished and both the Environment Protection Act and the Forest Conservation Act are rarely enforced. Our environs choke with pollutants. Most of the ministry officials look into issues of city pollution, river pollution, automobile fumes and so much that has fogged our urban areas. The less said about these enforcement mechanisms the better.

In all this "clear projects" activity is a tiny forest and wildlife wing of 60 - 75 people. They are supposed to look at 20 per cent of India. They are a "Wing", not even a department. They are supposed to save zoos, wildlife, forests and are endlessly under pressure to release forestland. Today it is impossible for them even to function, surrounded as they are by files and papers. They are supposed to advise the state but few listen to them. They have been reduced to a bank that disburses money to centrally sponsored schemes. They have no clout and this ministry has no effect or impact. For most of the time it functions as a Ministry of Environment.

When a tiger dies over-night it suddenly became a Ministry for Wildlife and even then only for a day or two. It must be rapidly bifurcated so that 20 per cent of this nation's natural treasures gets the priority it deserves. Let us never forget that we created at least five other dedicated ministries with cabinet ministers to exploit forest India - Coal, Mines, Petroleum, Power, Steel and Mines, Water Resources, Surface Transport and Rural Development: an endless list but we created nothing dedicated to protect forest India. What happens today is that both the minister and the secretary have to clear forested land and endless other projects on the one hand and try and protect forests and wildlife on the other.

It is a contradiction in terms and leads to bad governance. Clearance becomes the objective, protection the casualty. The same holds for the States. This is the tragedy that leads to Nandan Kanan and Hyderabad and the blood and gore that have been splashed on our faces.

Let us also look at the "poor" pushed around, the Indian Forest Service and its staff and what we have done to the more than 160,000 men who look after 20 per cent of India. We ignored this service and its men. We neglected them and made them subservient to the other services. Even though these are the people who guard our natural treasury and should have been given the same importance as the Army that guards our international frontiers, we, and in this case our political leadership, refused to strengthen this service. Let us never forget that these people are the guardians of the Bank of Nature, much more valuable then a bank that protects cash. We created airport and industrial security forces and at least 20 other security forces for different objectives, but why on earth did we not create a trained dedicated forest police force across India for forest officers to use?

There is a scam in every forest of India and many of these areas are ripped apart by so many mafias that it should have been common sense to create a crack force for protection. After all it is about protecting hundreds of thousands of crores worth of timber, grass, forest produce, wildlife, bio-diversity, medicinal plants and, with it, some of this nation's most precious water supply. These forests are great water catchment areas and at least 300 rivers and perennial streams flow from them. We have permitted the forest service to rot. I will give you an example here of how we do that.

A forest officer defends a forest against encroachers, illegal miners or unscrupulous business interests. The "illegals" find the nearest politician to transfer the officer. I have met many who have been transferred six times a year and whose children have suffered in terms of education. The whole process has been so traumatic that they are now silent spectators to the unfolding horrors. May be all this is intentional. May be we are a country of so many vested interests that leaving the doors and windows of our natural world open suits those who rule the roost. It is a way in which our laws can be violated with impunity because there is so little priority given to protection, enforcement and intelligence gathering. And the violations pile up.

Nandan Kanan and the Hyderabad zoo incidents are only symbolic of the state of affairs. Marble mining in the Jamua Ramgarh sanctuary, iron ore mining in the Kudremukh National Park, salt mining in the Wild Ass Sanctuary in Dhrangadhra, oil pipelines in the Marine National Park, irrigation projects in the Madhav National Park, limestone mining in the Sariska tiger reserve, the list of plunders and blunders is never ending.

Within years the natural world of this country would have virtually vanished and then will come real drought, famine and disease. I am no doomsday merchant. What I state is fact, not fiction. As our natural treasures are looted, human life will become torturous. So what can we do about it?

If we believe that the natural world of this nation has a right to live, then, with a great sense of urgency, we must force our elected leadership, and if necessary the President, to create a dedicated federal arm, a Ministry of Forests and Wildlife to look after 20 per cent of India.

On its creation there must be a total review of the Indian Forest Service in order to strengthen it and create for it its own dedicated policing force. Then must come the reform of the mechanisms of State Governments which are all-powerful and require change and fine tuning so that certain critical issues are addressed. And it can be since the subject of "Forests and Wildlife" is on the Concurrent List of the Constitution.

This is the only way to create effective structures for governance. It is the only preventive to ensure that Nandan Kanans and Hyderabad zoo killings do not take place, that hundreds of wild tigers and leopards do not die, that thousands of square kilometres of invaluable forest are not axed down, that business lobbies do not rip apart tracts of precious land for mining. We have a great emergency at hard within 20 per cent of India's land mass that is forest. We must find a way forward to secure this land, protect it and keep it alive for future generations of Indian people.

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