It appears that the tiger never stays out of controversy.
After the uproar about tiger numbers in the country about two years ago, the
topic in tiger conservation that stirred a storm across the country was the
recent closure of tourism in tiger reserve core zones by the Supreme Court. The
lifting of the embargo by the court after eleven weeks of closure had mixed
reactions. I am sure there were celebrations in some of the high profile
reserves where tourism flourished as a titanic service industry. Some moaned,
though most agree that low-key tourism as an education tool is a necessity.
Interestingly the court order says “all the concerned
authorities will ensure that the requirements in the aforesaid guidelines for
tourism in and around the tiger reserves are complied with before tourism
activities recommence”. Several of the topics discussed in the guidelines may not
have been met with. So if one played the devil’s advocate, can tourism actually
recommence?
Perhaps the court achieved one of the important goals it had
possibly aimed at. All state Governments have now delineated and notified
buffer zones. The big question is do all tiger reserves have ecologically
viable buffers that meets the true goals of a buffer? The authorities insist on
including villages into buffer areas but there is little lucidity to have
matrix of villages that have no tiger habitat either to act as sinks or
permeable corridors. Where no tiger habitat exists outside the core zones, declaration
of eco-sensitive zones would be better choices than buffers. Eco-sensitive zone
regulates land use patterns on the immediate vicinity of tiger reserves where
the growth of development such as mines or highways cannot be friendly
neighbors to tigers.
The tourism was allowed to reopen based on a set of
guidelines developed and submitted to the court. The two main thrusts of the
guidelines are on ecological and economics aspects of tiger tourism and a few
points from the document are worth debating.
The day after the court’s order to reopen tourism, media
highlighted that 20% of the core areas were to be utilized for tourism. I was
surprised when the guidelines were read in detail. The much publicized
regulation that only 20% of the core area is to be used for tourism does not
hold water. The guideline recommends “in case the current usage exceeds 20%,
the local advisory committee may decide on a timeframe for bringing down the
usage to 20%”. The word ‘may’ casts a doubt if tourism is going to be
restricted to 20%.
The glaring of all the violations which attract public
attention and the ire of wildlife enthusiasts is the riotous behavior of safari
drivers and mahouts (wherever elephants are used for viewing tigers). Most
times this is what is seen and easily understood by a common man bringing
aversion towards tourism. But the key issue that is out of public observation
and has real impact on tiger conservation is fragmentation of habitats where
tourism infrastructure blocks corridors (currently just an ecological term with
no legal backing). The guidelines suggests ‘shall inter alia, include
identification of corridor connectivity and important wildlife habitats and
mechanisms to secure them’. I wonder if out rightly putting a condition to make
corridors as a legal category under the Wildlife Protection Act 1972 and
recommending specific solutions to defragment blocked corridors could have
brought legal teeth to reduce fragmentation effects. Without such unambiguous
endorsements tourism infrastructure will continue to threaten tiger
preservation.
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| Tourism infrastructure like these that block wildlife movement are the most serious impacts of tourism. ©Jay Mazoomdar |
The state Governments have been asked to frame tourism and
eco-tourism (finally recognition that eco-tourism is different from tourism)
strategies within six months. This is another opportunity for framing policies
that can make real changes for tiger conservation. The forthcoming documents
should emphasize on mitigating the problem of fragmentation and callously deal
with land use even if the infrastructure is on private land.
Similarly using ecological criteria tourism should be
shifted to buffer zones, wherever such forest patches exists and have the
potential for tourism, in a phased but time bound manner. This in the long haul
will help both tourism and tigers.
On the economic front it is recommended that the park entry
fee be utilized for conservation purposes. The concept of tiger foundation has
already been implementing this for some years now. The guidelines seems to have
watered down the earlier concept of 20% of the revenues for local community
upliftment and human-wildlife conflict mitigation to a new model where the
conservation fees is based on category of facilities, occupancy and duration of
operation. A local advisory committee has been suggested for every tiger
reserve to monitor these guidelines. Hope these committees will be able to deal
with the implementation as most existing committees do not even function.
A minimum sighting distance of 20 meters from the animal has
to be maintained. A forest official quipped “who will hold the tape on the
other side”. Other recommendations such as proper disposal of waste, adhering
to pollution norms, use of renewable energy, are all rules that have been
etched in stone under various guidelines, rules and acts.
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| Several tourism operators and tourists show little respect to wildlife on safaris. ©Vineith |
I wonder if there is anything new in these guidelines to set things in the right direction. Unless there were time binding specific recommendations to defragment corridors the guidelines in the current state holds little on-ground benefits for the striped cat. I wonder what did this uproar and media hype achieve. Until another Ajay Dubey shakes the system the logjam will continue.
An edited version of this article is published in Deccan Herald on 30-10-2012
