Question : Wild Animals

(a) whether many wild animals including Tigers and elephants have been killed in controversial operations in the recent past;
(b) if so, the details thereof indicating the number of such wild animals died/killed during the last two years and the current year, State/UT-wise including Tamil Nadu and Maharashtra;
(c) whether the Government has constituted a central inquiry into the matter, if so, the details and the outcome thereof;
(d) whether the Government is banking on an Indo-German Human Wildlife conflict mitigation project to halt animal deaths and if so, the details thereof; and
(e) the States that are presently covered under the Indo-German pilot project and the time by which this project will be replicated at the national level?

MINISTER OF STATE IN THE MINISTRY OF ENVIRONMENT, FOREST AND CLIMATE CHANGE
(DR. MAHESH SHARMA)

(a) and (b) Management of wildlife is the responsibility of the concerned State/UT Governments. Report of deaths of wild animals including tigers and elephants in the recent past are collated in the Ministry are given in the Annexure-I and Annexure-II.

(c) As per information received by the National Tiger Conservation Authority. The rigor which goes into inquiry of tiger deaths in India is as follows:
(i) No tiger death is entered into the database, unless an authentic source from the State Government reports a tiger mortality.
(ii) Even if a tiger death is reported from third party sources to the NTCA, a confirmation is obtained from the State before recording it. It is subsequently made available in public domain at www.tigernet.nic.in, at the earliest.
(iii) All tiger deaths are dealt as per SOP issued by the NTCA in this regard (available in public domain) under suitable provisions of India’s Wildlife (Protection) Act, 1972.Non compliance is viewed seriously and in certain cases, if the situation so warrants, an inquiry is instituted by the Regional Office of the NTCA.
(iv) The onus of proving a case as natural or poaching, (with adequate evidences like Necropsy report, Pathology report, Coloured photographs, Forensic reports and other report as per the SOP format) rests with the State.
(v) There may be instances, wherein, the necropsy report provides clinching evidence to ascertain cause of death.
(vi) However, in absence of such evidences, supporting reports as listed above are used to come to a conclusion.
(vii) This analysis is done at the NTCA Headquarters at Delhi. Once ascertained, a cause is finally ascribed to a tiger’s death. In the event of any doubt, in spite of the evidences, the case is closed as poaching.

(d) &(e)The Ministry of Environment, Forest & Climate Change (MoEF&CC) in partnership with the German Development Cooperation (through Deutsche Gesellschaft für Internationale Zusammenarbeit (GIZ)) has approved the Indo-German technical cooperation project on ‘Human Wildlife Conflict Mitigation in India’. The project aims at providing technical support to the Government of India at the National level and in selected sites as pilot States like Karnataka, Uttarakhand and West Bengal only.


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