Alarming fall in NE elephant population

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The Assam Tribune,Guwahati, 04 July, 2005 (www.assamtribune.com)

 

Alarming fall in NE elephant population

By Sivasish Thakur

GUWAHATI, July 3 – The elephant population of the State and the

North East, at the receiving end of a worsening man-elephant

conflict, is increasingly finding itself pushed to the brink. A

traditional stronghold of the elephant, the region still shelters

over one-third of the country's total elephant population. But that

is just all about the good news, as habitat destruction and ruthless

killing have led to a steep decline in their numbers in all the

seven north-eastern States over the past decade.

 

According to Project Elephant data, Assam's elephant population of

5,524 in 1993 has gone down to 5,246 in 2002, an alarming decrease

of 278 in nine years at over 30-a-year. Meghalaya, another major

bastion of the pachyderm, fared worse – from a population of 2,872

in 1993 to 1,868 in 2002, which is a staggering loss of over a

thousand in less than a decade.

 

Arunachal Pradesh, another elephant country, suffered a similar

fate, as its population plummeted from 2,102 in 1993 to 1,607 in

2001, which is a shocking 500 deaths in just eight years. Nagaland,

as per the 2002 census has just 145 elephants left from its 1980

figure of 256. Tripura, Manipur and Mizoram have too few elephants

left to merit any mention.

 

While poaching for ivory has been an age-old problem, the past one

decade has seen an alarming rise in the man-elephant conflict –

thanks to rampant destruction of forest cover and fragmentation of

elephant habitats. This has had a disastrous consequence for the

elephants, as whenever they happen to raid cropland and human

settlement in search of food, they fall victim to poisoning,

gunshot, electrocution, and even spears and bows and arrows. A

number of human lives too have also been lost, and this has

embittered the traditional goodwill that used to characterize the

human-elephant relation in the State.

 

But more than poaching, it is the fatalities from the intensifying

man-elephant conflict, besides accidents (which often takes place

when elephants stray out due to habitat loss), that has emerged as

the bigger threat to the depleting elephant population over the last

decade.

 

In the past decade, the North East accounted for 90 per cent of the

elephant poisoning cases, 30 per cent of electrocution deaths and 60

per cent cases of elephants run over by trains, besides 20 per cent

of elephant poaching cases. As many as 20 elephants died of mass

poisoning in Sonitpur district in 2001, the worst case of elephant

poisoning ever.

 

Significantly, the North East also accounts for 43 per cent of the

human deaths caused by elephants. Sonitpur district of Assam, which

has been the worst affected by the man-elephant conflict, witnessed

a record loss of forest cover during the last decade. The ongoing

plundering by an elephant herd in Golaghat district is a direct

fallout of the growing human interference in an elephant corridor of

the Kaziranga-Karbi Anglong Elephant Reserve near Numaligarh.

 

The Barail-Saiphung range on Assam-Meghalaya border, declared an

Elephant Reserve in 1991, has been derecognized now, as it has got

very few elephants left.

 

Poaching took a heavy toll on the elephant population of the Manas

National Park during the 1990s and the early part of this

millennium, when the protected area was hit by a prolonged social

unrest. " At least 200 elephants must have perished in the last ten

years in Manas, " Dr Anwaruddin Choudhury, noted conservationist says.

 

" Protecting the existing forests and the elephant corridors is a

must if we are to save the State's remaining elephant population, "

Dr Choudhury says, adding that encroachment on the corridors needed

to be cleared immediately. " Elephants require a lot of space to

move, and disturbance in their natural corridors has led to

confrontations with humans, " he says.

 

According to the Chief Conservator of Forests (Wildlife), MC

Malakar, the worsening situation called for both short-term and long-

term measures. " Apart from short-term measures like anti-depredation

drives using domesticated elephants, power fencing, crop-damage

compensation, etc., we need to take long-term measures in the form

of forest cover protection, encroachment clearance, and restoration

of elephant corridors, " he said.

 

On paper, the North East has 37 per cent of the country's elephant

habitats and 35 per cent of the recorded corridors. But much of

those now lie degraded and fragmented. It also has nine of the 25

Elephant Reserves, and 16 of the 64 national parks and sanctuaries

harbouring elephants.