Saving the sink precursor to the survival of the tigers in India

The Contingency & The PA Concept

I remember my first visit to Kanha National Park in the early seventies. The Wildlife Protection Act was promulgated and thankfully the slaughter of our precious wildlife was brought to a much-needed end. Although Kanha had received some form of protection right from the 18th Century onwards whence the British ruled India, the initiatives were limited and infallible. Nevertheless, Halon and Banjar Valley still supported sensitive wild species like the hard-ground swamp deer and the tiger at the commencement of the Project Tiger Program. This was the saving grace for future conservation initiatives, and the results have been spectacular.

The year of my visit was perhaps 1972, and the tiger population in India had plummeted to below the 1400 mark perhaps from over 40,000 at the turn of the century. There seemed no recourse for the doomed species till the Project Tiger Program was initiated. After initial hiccups, the program is right back on the track with a population of the endangered carnivore over the 3000 mark.

The Protected Areas have two components the inner inhabitable and inviolate core, and the outer buffer or the sink area as some conservationists refer to it. The PA and the reserves have delivered a yeomen's service with the active participation of wildlife managers and the sentinels. In a human-dominated conservation landscape, the exploitative nature of our species would have proved disastrous in the absence of the PAs and the WPA Act.

*Note the human presence in the core is limited to the forest guards and their hutments a crucial protection feature. Regulated tourism subject to terms and conditions is allowed in 20% of the core area for the common people.

Us & Them

Sensitive wild species need inviolate areas to breed and survive in an intact ecosystem small or big. Humans are notorious for destroying habitats that support wild species under one excuse or other, and even with judicial intervention albeit rarely. We have nearly lost all grasslands and wetlands in the country that are the first target of agrarian settlers and commercial exploiters. The forests survived, however, limited in extent due to the immense spread and not due to our sagacity.

We have come to own the Earth with no consideration for other life forms, and the environment as whole. The destruction of wetlands, forests, and savannahs, the chaos as regards marine conservation, and the pollution ensuing from unchecked use of fossil fuels all are precursors to species extinction and the global warming that is wreaking havoc in the contemporary era. If this continues human extinction could be imminent. This is not a speculation, an equilibrium the Earth's environment maintains is crucial for our survival and it is unfortunately extremely fragile.

Early Years

A dilapidated and pockmarked single metal road in the interiors led to the park from Chiraidongri township in Mandla District. All around the roads were dark smokey hamlets with tiled or thatched roofs far removed from the modern amenities that were developing in urban India, the people were poverty-stricken, isolated, and living in the absolute past. I still recall the solitude and the smell of fire woods and the staid humble faces (mostly tribal) that stared at us in absolute consternation. Wilderness was to them a natural phenomenon there was nothing exotic about it like it was to us who were at the turn of the century far removed from the inheritance. This critical inheritance is not only the prerogative of the local forest-dwelling communities it belongs to all Indians.

In that era I was armed with little knowledge of how the ecosystem and its components worked, the wilderness was a frightening prospect of an encounter with the ferocious big cats of unimaginable proportions. These misconceptions were thankfully erased from any reckoning as I grew up and tourism was the major interpreter. Despite having many detractors, ecotourism creates awareness and respect for our inheritance and a large human population is better endowed with the knowledge of the precious wilderness nowadays.

Tiger visibility has increased considerably as compared to the seventies a conservation succes yardstick.

Wildlife Protection Act 1972 & Formation of the Protected Areas

An alert Prime Minister passionate about the country's inheritance was at the forefront of nature conservation, a much-needed reprieve after the years of slaughter by the elites and the poachers. Hon. Prime Minister Indira Gandhi invited those at the helm of forestry and conservation like Mr. Kailash Sankhala and the Wildlife Protection Act was formulated that made the hunting of scheduled wild animals an offense and invites punitive measures. The WPA 1972 formed the bulwark against wildlife offenses besides supporting the legal framework as an aid to the dedicated wildlife managers and the staff at the helm.

Project Tiger

There were initial failures as it took time to comprehend how the international poaching and illegal trade network worked with the local complicit in India. An inaccurate consensus also led to fatal complacency. Despite the launch of the program, the numbers had not increased during the period post-initiation, and then the mass slaughter of the tigers at Panna and Sariska Reserves was a shocking disclosure of the ineptitude of the whole exercise. The country's legal system sometimes is lax on criminals due to the age-old framework. It provided loopholes to established and well-known unlawful wildlife parts traders like Sansar Chand who was most likely instrumental in these horrendous poaching incidences and the illegal wildlife trade. In the loop were some staff from the forest department and the local poachers.

The stories made headlines globally, and a shocked department began to reshuffle the protection mechanism and subsequent best practices were inducted keeping in mind the vulnerability of poverty-stricken communities besides the habitual criminals. Due to constant vigilance, evolving conservation strategies, and initiatives the populations in the core of the tiger reserves have increased.

Sink

Tigers are highly territorial predators with an established hierarchical order that is little understood. Being at the top of the food chain they are crucial indicator species that indicate the health of the country's remaining ecosystems designated as tiger reserves.

Although the conservation initiatives in the seventies with subsequent reforms envisaged the coexistence of the wild species with humans this laid down principal at the present juncture is at best chimerical but with strong conservation ethos shaped during the Vedic Era rubbishing this phenomenon in its entirety would be foolhardy. The creation and designation of the core will remain inviolate and well preserved for eternity, and any dilution would be disastrous for not only the tiger but the whole ecosystem.

But due to burgeoning human factors, the buffer or the outer area has been filtered out of stringent conservation measures and humans have some leeway here. Although recent amendments have been merciful on the extent of indulgence, and commercial activities at industrial levels have been prohibited subject to a distance from the core, the buffer zone encapsulates a larger area. As a matter of fact, it expands outside the limits of the buffer areas as designated.

Tigers are limited by an inhabitable area a certain population dynamics prevails among them and this is universal. Transient populations of young males, and the aging tigers unable to face competition move towards the periphery wherever substantial crown cover prevails. To this, we must add an intermediate population of the big cats which have naturally adopted the outer region by birth or due to population pressure. A swelling population of big cats expands the area of inhabitation, and this is limited only by the availability of habitable grounds.

The Challenges

Though tigers are often conditioned to the humans in the core to some extent the situation that prevails in the buffer is overwhelming. In absence of the right conservation initiatives and the protection mechanism, the survival of the big cat population will entirely be limited to a well-managed core.

But is this enough?

Managing the buffer or the sink area with sagacity and expeditiously is imperative. Frequent incidences of man-animal conflicts indicate a lack of well-planned strategies due to the bureaucratic lethargy and overwhelming complexities associated with that particular sink. The biggest culprit is the country's electoral system which has become populistic in nature. The political interference in conservation and environmental protection is very much there. The Forests Rights Act empowers the gram Sabahs to be active participants in conservation or the members at least have a say. Let's wait for the impact although people's participation is a welcoming initiative will this work in a heavily politicized environment?

Most often it is the overwhelming complexities of a human-dominated environment that impacts conservation initiatives and the protection mechanism at work in the sink.

Though the legal framework prohibits intense commercial activities some distance from the core, this will not be enough in the future whence the populations increase further. Extensive tiger landscape management has to be in place with equal emphasis before all is lost. Framing and regulating land-use patterns and restrictions on activities is a management headache for the authorities with volatile public resentment in place with instances easily fomented by vote-hungry politicians.

Although the protection mechanism is present in virtually all the tiger landscapes, the exigencies are not that evident, and frequent incidence of poaching, electrocution, wood logging, and unlawful expansion of agricultural fields besides the expansion of habitable areas prevails. These are the real challenges that forest management faces in the sink area.

Infrastructure projects especially the liner development initiatives are cleared in the country without much consideration of immediate and long-term consequences. There is a fervent zeal to be counted among the advanced Nations. Although very little can be done regarding these interventions in the natural lands at least viability should be measured with greater emphasis. Alternatives like simple underpasses or over bridges have been favorable for animal migration without accidents. Similar alternatives should be in consideration as regards projects that will eventually be executed.

Functional connectivity between forest patches in the buffer is of immediate concern since the expansion of urbanity in these areas is at a rapid pace. The local communities have benefitted immensely from ecotourism in the reserve and that has resulted in higher income figures than in the past. With greater affluence, structural expansion is becoming evident as modern amenities creep in. Unfortunately, this is happening in most of the buffer zones due to rising income. Shopping centers, restaurants, and service providers all are expanding their deliveries overtaking a larger area. This is leading to encroachment of the few viable habitats in the buffer. The tigers and the prey base will be forced to saturate the core leading to unnatural conflicts between the big cats and the prey base.

Nature controls stressful existence with the reduction in population in the wild. Thus, sooner than later the domino effect will result in plummeting of the tiger population once again this time due to a faulty system in place.

Tigers need large habitable forests and grasslands to survive small inviolate cores will not be functional as populations rise. This is the challenge wildlife managers and policymakers will have to deal with in near future.

The next big challenge being faced is that of corridor creation and management. Corridors are not just conduits for animal migration they could hold a stable population of wild animals as well hence land-use patterns and conflict management is very much applicable to these vital passages.

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Uday has worked as a naturalist for a number of years at Kanha National Park in Central India. He is fond of writing on conservation issues for the common man.

Uday works as SEO for Digital Marketing and Content Writer. He also teaches digital marketing in Jabalpur. He is closely connected to nature as a naturalist.