Report of the Tiger Task Force - PRS

TIGER TASK FORCE REPORT JOINING THE DOTS ■The guidelines of 1974: relevant today“In her DO letter No 694-PM/73 dated December 27,1973 addressed to the chief ministers of all statesand Union territories on the foregoing subject, theprime minister had, among other things,emphasised the need for specialised managementof our national park and sanctuaries, optimumutilisation of wildlife staff with experience andexpertise and recruitment of additional staff toeffectively enforce the provisions of the Wildlife(Protection) Act, 1972. The following importantorganisational arrangements were accordinglyapproved by the prime minister and circulated tothe chief secretaries of all states and Unionterritories for implementation, under thisministry’s letter No _J 11013/5/74-FRY/WLF datedDecember 23, 1974:a) At the state level, a beginning was required tobe made without delay to established a separatewildlife wing under the overall charge of thechief conservator of forests. This wing wasrequired to be headed by an officer of the rankof conservator of forests in other states. Officerswho were already trained in wildlifemanagement work were required to beidentified and posted immediately to this wing.b) Such identified officers posted in the wildlifewing at various levels were not expected to betransferred to the forestry wing unless equallytrained officers were available to replace them.When an officer became ripe for promotion inthe forestry wing and a suitable officer was notavailable to replace him, the post held by himin the wildlife wing was required, as far aspossible, to be upgraded so that his services,expertise and experience continued to beavailable to the wildlife wing.c) In order to maintain performance standards, allpersons directly or indirectly concerned withwildlife management were required to beregularly assessed in their annual reports fortheir performance in wildlife conservationwork.”This is an extract of a letter by N D Jayal, jointsecretary (F&WL), ministry of agriculture andirrigation, dated September 16, 1976 to all stateforest secretaries.(now the National Board for Wildlife), it was foundthat despite specific instructions and guidelinesissued by the Central government, a number of stateshad not acted; only 13 had set up wildlife wings. Allstates were, therefore, directed to ensure that separatewildlife wings be set up immediately and that“suitable personnel with aptitude for wildlife workare actually manning those wings”. Detailedguidelines were issued for the formation of thewildlife wings; these remain extremely relevant tilldate (see box: The guidelines of 1974: relevant today).Then unfortunately, beginning late 1980s, theinternal management of the project began to declinesteadily. Guidelines issued by the Centralgovernment under the specific instructions ofthe then prime minister Indira Gandhi wereconveniently forgotten and, as a result, went intodisuse. In fact, the Tiger Task Force would like to puton record the extreme frustration it encountered tolocate these crucial guidelines.By the late 1990s, the only project guidelines thatremained in operation, and that states had to follow,involved the submission of the following:1. Monthly summary of important events/happenings in the tiger reserve — a narrativereport;2. Monthly report on deaths of all wildlife in thetiger reserve;3. Reports on poaching incidences and unnaturaldeaths of tigers and leopards (as and whenrequired);4. An annual report from the tiger reserve (the 1973format now discontinued); and5. Annual utilisation certificate and expenditurestatement.The guidelines for the all India tiger census wereissued periodically; these continued to stress on theuse of the pugmark method. In the late 1990s, a briefnote was sent to states outlining the limitations ofpugmarks. But nothing much was done at this stageto review and revamp the science of tiger estimation.What also deteriorated in the 1990s wascoordination and internal supervision, critical forany effective programme. It must be noted that suchdecline began to occur in a period when the role andautonomy of state governments grew. The effectiveoutcome was that, as reserve managements becameless accountable to the Centre, monitoring in tigerreserves went from bad to worse. The Project Tigerdirectorate, weak as it was in this period, became byall accounts an institution that merely disbursedfunds and had little control over implementation.Many states stopped submitting monitoring reports;some did not find it necessary to get Centralgovernment approval in appointing key officials. Theminutes of Project Tiger steering committee meetingsThe assessment 9