Report of the Tiger Task Force - PRS

TIGER TASK FORCE REPORT JOINING THE DOTS ■leading to unsustainable use and destruction. Thetigers are under threat and the park authorities haveto focus their energies on protecting against all odds.It is clear that the status quo is unsustainable andunproductive. The situation has once again createdanti-conservation anger and jeopardised protection(see box: Melghat’s conservation conundrum).People verses tigersIn this situation, matters are fast deteriorating. Thelaw provides that the rights of people should besettled before a sanctuary or national park can beformally notified. But this has not been done. Peoplelive in protected areas and are driven to destitution.If tigers kill their livestock, there is no compensationbecause their existence is not legal; if they want tosell their private land, they cannot because it is notallowed. They cannot collect minor forest producebecause it is interpreted to be illegal in the permitsystem that operates and they cannot graze animalsor even practice agriculture in many cases. Butbecause they live there, they engage in all theseactivities. It is done illegally. It is done undertremendous harassment and it leads to corruption. Itis also completely unsustainable as illicit use onlymakes the use more destructive.In all this, conservationists keen to protect thetiger and other species are asking for even strictercompliance and adherence to what they perceive isthe legal framework. They make no mention of thefact that in the absence of rights remainingunsettled, the process of declaring an area as aprotected area is incomplete and illegal. Selectiveinterpretation of the law is leading to huge conflicts— inside and outside protected areas. It is truly awar within, imploding inside reserves and takingeverything in its wake.Is coexistence then possible? How?Conservation policy in India, which aims to exclude(remove) people from protected area, is based on thepremise that all human use is detrimental toconservation. It is also built on the assumption thatpeople’s knowledge is irrelevant in the managementof protected areas. But again, given the reality of theIndian situation where people live within theprotected reserves, it is important to revisit theseassumptions to look for answers beyond.Even when villages are proposed for relocation,wildlife authorities have little empirical evidence ofthe impact that needs to be contained. For instance,there is one village — with less than 35 families — inthe tiger reserve of Pench in Maharashtra. Reserveauthorities are determined to relocate the village, atconsiderable cost, to degraded forest land in thevicinity of the reserve. They estimate that, with thepayment of the net present value, as mandated bythe Supreme Court for diversion of forest land tonon-forestry purposes, the relocation will cost overRs 3-4 crore.When the Tiger Task Force visited Pench, itasked officials about the impact of this tinysettlement on the reserve, which would then explainwhy it had to be relocated. The officials couldnot explain why. Nor had they any idea of whatcould be done to mitigate its impact or manage itsresource use.It is, therefore, essential we understand thepossible human impacts, so that policy can be betterinformed and effective. There is no comprehensiveassessment of this issue but an analysis of theresearch papers for different protected areas can helpto build a better understanding of the situation.The fact is that people, who live in the protectedreserves and on its fringes, depend on its resourcesfor their survival. Rucha Ghate from NagpurUniversity has worked on quantifying the value ofthe minor forest produce used by people livingwithin Tadoba-Andhari tiger reserve inMaharashtra. She gathered information on thenumber of cattle and the collection of fodder,firewood, medicinal plants, fruits and householdtimber. She found the imputed value of theseresources was a staggering Rs 77.5 lakh per year forall six villages in the sanctuary. Importantly, as littleas 25 per cent of the annual income came from “legalsources” — agriculture and employment; the bulk(67 per cent) came from consumption of forestproduce like fodder, fuel and fruits and the rest fromillicit bamboo sale. 12Still, Ghate found that even with this level ofresource use of resources in the period 1989-2001,forest cover had actually increased, and not reduced,in the tiger reserve. In fact, she found the habitat wasmore degraded where there was pressure from thevillages outside village and not in the areassurrounding the villages inside the reserve. Herconclusion and submission to the Tiger Task Force,therefore, is that until the villages are relocated, theyshould be involved in protection work within thesanctuary, earning between Rs 1,000-1,200 permonth per household. Furthermore, if people areinvolved in tourism, they will have a greater stake inthe reserve and can be encouraged to become humanbuffers. To meet the needs of people, plantation offodder and firewood belts around the buffer villageswill take pressure off the reserve. In other words, themanagement strategy should move from being‘exclusive’ to ‘inclusive’ says Ghate. 13Another researcher, Harini Nagendra, who hasbeen working on satellite image-mapping of differentreserves, confirms that within Tadoba-Andhari, forThe way ahead 109