PLIGHT OF TIGERS AND THE TRIBALS

                                                      @ Arunesh c dave

                                                          A tribesman with forest produced honey comb

 

There is hue and cry going around about tiger deaths in infighting and in conflict with the humans. Activists involved in tiger protection blame the Forest Department for being irresponsible while the Forest Department either claim it to be a natural phenomenon or looks out for scapegoats in tribal or its own lower cadre . But if we assess practically, we can draw a simple conclusion i.e. the number of tiger has reduced to the point of extinction as a consequence of our past actions.

 

Britishers in their time of rule in India started to change our natural forest  which comprised mostly of fruit and flower bearing trees to plantation of commercial timbers in the name of standardization  of forest . while doing so they failed to analyze the impact and catastrophe it will cause on wildlife as well as human beings . Post independence forest department of India which followed rules and regulations laid by their predecessors did the same work .No place apart from former hunting grounds of maharajah's , some remote area's or  areas under patronage  of people like Corbet and Billy arjun singh and some reserve forests  which came under project tiger in early stages  and had the advantage of evicted grasslands  tigers are  no where to be seen .

 

 why tigers are  not in production forests which covers a huge chunk of our remaining forest cover  is not a mathematical quest answer is simple and it is for all other species too "unless food is there none can survive"  .  In production forests we do not have fruit and flower bearing trees instead have tree's like teak and sal etc to fulfill the need of rich people but it  dose not provide food to herbivores and tribals and they also prevent under growth of grass and shrubs . And in absence of fruits; flowers grass and shrubs herbivorous rely on crops of villagers but in absence of of forest food these crops are only life line of these tribal villagers so they  kill them . In absence of herbivore tiger too relay on village animals and in turn gets the highest  punishment of death .

Forest of our national parks too have already been standardized and contain mostly sal , teak and similar trees but they have huge grass lands which were created by shifting villages under project tigers . These grasslands are the last support of the food chain of our dwindling tiger population and that is why our forest officers are so keen to shift villages out of national parks and sanctuaries . They also know know that  re-convert  these commercial forest in to natural forest is huge and moneyless task so they don't even dream of it

 

Availability of  food decides number of tigers any park can sustain  it decides how much sq km a tiger will need to survive this area differs from park to park (e.g. kaziranga has a tiger per three sq km  and kanha has a tiger every 12 sq km ) this area also differs within the park  depending on richness of habitat  . suppose kanha can sustain 120 tigers , as per my own estimates  at least 20 new  tigers will look for their place in this jam packed place very few mostly females  will find room for natural reasons and unlucky one's will go either outside or will die in infighting.

 

 

Those tigers which opt to go out of park boundaries are destined to live in degraded or commercially converted production forests and death is almost certain for aforesaid reasons . this problem gets worse when females having half grown cubs go out due to change in dominance of male tigers  in this case female needs double food and has limited mobility and in turn death is almost certain to her and her little ones . These deaths were pre decided not by god but by us we have created a situation in which no tiger can survive outside the national parks and when heavy poaching takes place like it did in panaa and sariska there were no tigers in periphery to claim the place and parks became tiger less

This is not plight of tigers alone tribal people which relied heavily on forest to provide food after standardization of forest ended up to so dire consequences that when prime minister of India visited kalahandi (orrisa) two women of same family could not  come out to meet him at the same time as they had only 1 dress to share  .  Any one who claims to be conservationist must understand forest is for all tigers and tribal not for the need of people of cities and unless we reconvert out forests in to fruit and flower bearing trees all we can do is wishful thinking