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Tigers Coming Home to Sariska Reserve

May 25, 2007

The Sariska Tiger Reserve Park used to almost guarantee views of the big cats. But India's national animal has disappeared from the reserve because of poaching and a massive conservation scandal widely blamed on the park and state authorities' negligence. Now Rajhastan's government plans to bring them back.

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Tigers are increasingly at risk of poaching: A single skin can reach up to 20,000 US dollars
Tigers are increasingly at risk of poaching: A single skin can reach up to 20,000 US dollarsImage: Harun Ur Rashid Swapan

The Rajashtan government and Sariska Tiger Reserve officers say that they have learnt from their past mistakes. They are now planning to bring tigers back to the reserve in what conservationists say will be the world's first ever attempt to reintroduce tigers to their natural habitat.

"The government is also planning to relocate villagers from that area as well," says Titu Joseph, a senior officer at the Wildlife Trust of India.

Following International Union for the Conservation of Nature (IUCN) guidelines, five young adult tigers, including three females, will be introduced over a period of three years. The stock will come from the neighbouring Ranthambore National Park, which has a similar environment to Sariska.

Officials say the tigers will be fitted with radio collars with a satellite tracking facility and there will be a team of around 12 forest officers as well as wildlife researchers to constantly monitor the animals.

Protection from poaching

Conservationists have welcomed the plan, but stress that all the factors which led to the extinction of Sariska's tigers must now be addressed. Wildlife expert P. K. Sen says that people living in the forests pose the biggest threat to tigers, as they are often hired by organised poachers to kill the animals.

"They can’t claim that they can bring tigers and protect them as well," he warns. "Unfortunately in India the mechanism of protection is at the lowest -- that's why tigers are being poached in every corner. No park can claim that tigers haven't been poached. The prime cause is the attitude of the government. Wildlife doesn’t have priority"

The semi-arid region in western India's Aravalli Hill Range was once the tiger's ideal habitat. There were about 40,000 tigers in India a century ago, but decades of poaching and the depletion of their natural habitat have cut their numbers to under 3,500. Some wildlife experts say the total number could even be as low as 1,200.

Environmentalists say the world trade in animal parts is second only to narcotics. A single tiger skin can fetch up to 20,000 US dollars on the international market.