Centre working towards inclusive tiger conservation effort: Union minister Bhupender Yadav

The Centre has been working towards an inclusive conservation effort by involving local communities who live in close proximity to tiger reserves, Union Environment Minister Bhupender Yadav said on Wednesday. Addressing the inaugural session of the pre-summit meeting of ‘tiger range countries’ here, Yadav said special campaigns to make tiger reserves plastic-free are also operational. He said the Government of India intends to strengthen its partnerships and collaboration with all the tiger range countries to secure the future of wild tigers both in India and at the global level. “India has taken giant strides in tiger conservation. The one thing that Prime Minister Narendra Modi has stressed repeatedly is that our conservation efforts are not a drag on development,” Yadav said. He said India is reorienting conservation strategies to focus on the protection and propagation of wildlife without compromising on development. Speaking about the management of tiger population, the Union minister said, “India has been at the forefront of implementing a science-based, peer-reviewed tiger monitoring methodology approved by the Tiger Task Force. So far, four cycles of countrywide estimation have taken place and the 5th cycle of All India Tiger Estimation is currently underway.” He further stated that the wild tiger conservation in India has codified several practices, which have been proving to be useful for reintroducing locally extinct species like the Cheetah.

Quoting an excerpt from the Mahabharata, Yadav said, “Do not destroy the forest which is the abode of tigers. Do not hunt and kill the tigers because they protect the forests. Both cannot exist without the other.” Delegates from 11 out of 13 tiger range countries, including Bhutan, Thailand, Cambodia, Nepal, Laos and Kazakhstan, participated in the pre-summit meeting.

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