This story is from July 28, 2021

‘Tiger habitats overlooked in rush to grant nod for infra projects’

‘Tiger habitats overlooked in rush to grant nod for infra projects’
In India, tigers act as an umbrella species for majority of eco-regions as they reside in a wide variety of habitats extending from the mountains, mangrove, tall grasslands, to dry and moist deciduous forests, as well as evergreen forest systems
Nagpur: Even as the country celebrates increase in tiger population from 2,226 in 2014 to 2,967 in 2018, tiger habitats in the country continue to degrade with every clearance being accorded by various statutory committees like the Forest Advisory Committee (FAC), Regional Empowered Committee (REC), Standing Committee of National Board for Wildlife (SC-NBWL) and Expert Appraisal Committee (EAC).

The issue of concern is that tiger habitats (tiger reserves and corridors) continue to be diverted for infrastructural projects such as roads, railways, pipelines, transmission lines, etc. “This is despite the fact that many of these projects could have clearly avoided using the tiger habitats since alternative routes do exist. Our analysis shows that in the rush to grant approval, tiger concerns and its habitat are overlooked,” says Tanvi Sharma, associate analyst with Legal Initiative for Forest and Environment (LIFE).
In India, tigers act as an umbrella species for majority of eco-regions as they reside in a wide variety of habitats extending from the mountains, mangrove, tall grasslands, to dry and moist deciduous forests, as well as evergreen forest systems. The tigers are living in isolated reserve patches with connectivity with other areas being lost.
Landscape connectivity plays a significant role in conserving the species which maintains the gene flow and influences the rate of genetic diversity. Fragmentation of landscape creates isolated patches of the population where the viability of the decreased metapopulation has much lesser chances of survival as every adult tiger has a wide territory, and requires disruption-free movement.
In the past two years, FAC headed by the DG (Forest) and Standing Committee of the NBWL headed by the environment minister has granted many clearances to projects that cut through important tiger reserves and corridors. The SC-NBWL approved diversion of 325 hectares in 2019 and 595 hectares in 2020 in prime tiger habitats.
Going through the clearances granted by SC-NBWL in the four meetings conducted so far this year shows that over 770 hectares of tiger habitat has been diverted in 2021.

According to Sharma, several projects are in the pipeline waiting to be cleared. “Merely declaring new tiger reserves will not ensure the long-term conservation of tigers unless there is political and administrative will to consider these areas as ‘no go’ so far as human impacts are concerned. An example of this is Rajaji Tiger Reserve in Uttarakhand, where a total of six road projects involving an area of 139 hectares were approved for diversion in the last one year,” said Sharma.
All these road upgrade are in close vicinity or in the eco-sensitive zone (ESZ) of the reserve affecting important tiger and elephant corridors.
A similar case was of Mukundra Hills Tiger Reserve (MHTR) in Rajasthan, where 10 projects were approved in 2020 diverting 81 hectares from the tiger reserve and its surrounding corridors. An area of 54 hectares was diverted for nine limestone mining projects in Chechat lying in the surrounding tiger corridors. Besides, for development of an eight-lane Greenfield highway, a section of which runs through MHTR, 27 hectares forest was diverted from within the tiger reserve.
Outside the tiger reserve, this project diverts area from Barkalaji reserve forest which acts as a tiger corridor lying contiguous to the MHTR. The tiger reserve area to be diverted has 0.8 density of forest and is rich in biodiversity in the entire stretch with very good quality of vegetation.
Apart from these, a Castle Rock Tinaighat railway line doubling project in Goa- Karnataka was approved by the MoEFCC despite the fact that the National Tiger Conservation Authority (NTCA) has raised serious concerns about the lack of cumulative impact assessment and splitting up the project into small forest patches to obtain speedy approval.
Despite stiff opposition from the public, linear projects have been approved in areas which are critical tiger areas in the Goa–Karnataka border which includes Kali Tiger Reserve, Mollem National Park, and other sensitive areas.
Such diversions from tiger habitats increase incidences of human-wildlife conflicts and animal deaths due to road and railway accidents. On June 18, 2021, a tiger died in a car hit on NH-43, around 35km from Umaria in MP. Another tiger was killed in a car accident in Nainital, Uttarakhand, on January 6, 2021.
Not only tigers but the loss of human lives has also been reported due to predator attacks. On May 19, 2021, three women were killed in separate incidents of tiger attacks in Chandrapur, Maharashtra.
A tiger safari was recommended last year for establishment in 106 hectares forest land in Pauri Garhwal (Uttarakhand), which lies in the buffer of Corbett Tiger Reserve at a distance of about 4 km.
The area has leopards and elephants due to which several incidents of human-elephant conflicts have been recorded in the past. This tiger safari has been approved by NTCA, justifying it by proposing the construction of a wildlife rescue centre which in addition to eco-tourism benefits will help in the rescue and conservation of injured wild animals and in reducing human-wildlife conflicts.
The current state of tiger habitats demands their restoration and improvement in the protection budget. However, on the contrary, the budget for Project Tiger has been reduced by Rs100 crore in the past two years and NTCA has been given only a Rs10 crore budget for 51 tiger reserves in the country occupying about 73,000 sq km.
“By way of comparison, the Central Silk Board gets an annual allocation of Rs875 crore. As the country prepares to ‘welcome’ a new predator in India – the cheetah, on International Tiger Day, it’s time to reflect whether we have the political will or administrative capacity to protect the national animal. Tigers in India continue to face increased risk and unless proactive steps are taken to protect its habitat, time is clearly running out for tigers in the wild,” said Sharma.
End of Article
FOLLOW US ON SOCIAL MEDIA