Poaching affects wildlife in UP hills

By Santosh Verma

The Times of India News Service (May 5, 1998)

NAINITAL: Poaching, poisoning or trappings are taking a heavy toll of wildlife, including tiger, which is fast dwindling in the Kumaon and Garhwal hills. If environment laws are not corrected immediately, there will be further deterioration in the ecology of the region and could lead to the extinction of many wildlife forms, warns WWF-India UP state committee.

The committee, in its recent report, has sought changes in the Environment Protection Act of 1986 to give more teeth to forest laws. It has pleaded with the state government to extend legal protection to the green cover of urban U.P. along with effective steps to protect saplings.

Among the other steps suggested are: revamping of the ``UP Protection of the Trees in Rural and Hill Area Act 1976'' along with its schedules, proper implementation of the Motor Vehicles Act, UP parks and playgrounds and the open spaces preservation and regulation Act and a comprehensive law to protect the flora of the country.

``The authorities have broadly accepted our contentions on the issues and action in each case is on the anvil,'' says Ranjit Bhargava, chairman of the committee. The protection of greater Nainital area is among the priorities and remedies suggested for the ecologically disturbed districts, he adds.

The committee has also emphasised the need for a special police force to patrol India-Nepal border to prevent poaching and illicit felling of trees in the protected areas bordering Nepal. It has demanded a ban on the smuggling of herbs, revival of forest at Vrindavan and prevention of the export of the botanically unidentified plants and eradication of noxious weeds like lantana and parthenium.

It has expressed concern on the overuse of the herbal wealth of the UP hills, besides destruction of aromatic and medicinal plants from the Kumaon and Garhwal hills. Creation of a wildlife service is the need of the hour as, according to experts, the tiger is being increasingly targeted for extermination not only by poachers but also by farmers who poison the carcasses of livestock that the tiger kills.

According to Anup Sah, member of the WWF-India, at least one lion is being killed every week either by poaching, poisoning or trappings. Poaching, he says, is openly going on in Kumaon hills and musk deer and Himalyan bear are the targets.

In the high-altitude areas, poachers can be spotted moving freely, particularly in Johar and Darma valley in the Pithoragarh district, Mr Sah says.

Villagers in the district earn their livelihood through illegal poaching and destroy forests to keep musk deer. They also burn some forests to chase musk deer, he told The Times of India News Service. The kasturi of a musk deer sells for Rs 3,000 per 10 gm (one deer can yield up to 70 gm) and a Himalayan bear sells for around Rs 1 lakh, he says. Even in musk deer sanctuaries like Nanda Devi poaching is rampant due to lack of local intelligence network.