Sunday 30 September 2012
News updated at 1:03 PM IST
CONSERVATION
Sasan Gir National Park in Gujarat is still
the last bastion of the Asiatic lion, and the local Maldharis have
lived peacefully with the wild cat. What is upsetting the fragile
natural balance is the increasing livestock population that is competing
with the wild ungulates for the same forest sources, observes Atula
Gupta.
Sasan Gir National Park in Gujarat is a
conservation success story. What was 45 years ago a crumbling forest
with the entire population of the Asiatic lion on its deathbed, has
bounced back today into a verdant, self-sustaining ecosystem.
It
is still the last bastion of the regal predator, but the human
population here has made peace with nature and allowed the wild cat to
reign and expand its brood. What is though beginning to shake the
fragile natural balance is the increasing livestock population that is
competing with wild ungulates for the same forest sources. Resultantly,
the prey-predator dynamics of the region are starting to change.
Panthera
leo persica or the Asiatic lion is a distant cousin of the African
lion. But while the African lion has acres and acres of jungles and
savannah under its territory, its Asian counterpart has had a turbulent
history with ever-shrinking habitat and gun-friendly royalties killing
the beast for pleasure and pomp.
It indeed was the Nawab of
Junagadh who finally bestowed on the jungle king, the respect it
deserved and banned hunting in his private landholdings. This and the
declaration of Gir as a sanctuary and a national park in 1965 ensured
that the Asiatic lion had a safe 1400 sq km of land to itself, if not a
vast empire.
But the semi-arid region of Junagadh is also home
to a pastoral community called the Maldharis. This community has long
endured losses in livestock and human life, while many of their grazing
practices and traditional customs have contributed to human-lion
altercations. When it was first planned to create a protected area in
Gir for the lions, stabilisation of the species population and the
reclamation of its dwindling habitat focused on maintaining a workable
human-lion co-existence.
Distorted food cycle
In
a study conducted by Bombay Natural History Society, Smithsonian
Institution and Yale University called the ‘The Gir Lion Project’ in
1970, it was found that about 21,000 domestic livestock grazed within
the sanctuary and this number doubled or tripled during the dry season.
The
research noted there was a very low population of wild herbivores as
the competing cattle grazed in the forest grassland and left little for
the deer and sambhars. Naturally, lions fed “almost exclusively” on
Maldharis’ livestock in the absence of their natural prey. Consequently,
to avoid future conflicts, Maldhari families were shifted between 1970
and 1985 and a rubber wall built to keep the livestock away from the
forest. Wild herbivores were also bred to increase their population.
Today,
there are more than 400 lions in Gir, and the population is steadily
growing. The prey population of chital, sambhar, nilgai, wild boar,
four-horned antelope, langur and chinkara have increased dramatically
and their total population now stands at nearly 70,000. This is good
news for the forest and a sustainable working scenario.
But with
the number of domesticated herbivores like cattle and sheep beginning
to increase once again, potential distortion of the food cycle and rise
in human-lion conflict is a certainty.
According to a veteran
forest department official, “Livestock population has reached the 1970
levels again, and there is increasing competition between domestic and
wild herbivores, leading to degradation of patches in the forest area
and more cases of carnivores attacking the Maldharis’ livestock.” The
only possible solution is planning another re-location drive, but even
experts realise that it is not an easy task to accomplish.
Conservation dilemmas
On
top of the list are the financial costs that will be incurred to move
and re-settle thousands of humans and tens of thousands of animals.
There
will also be need for a vast new settling ground and an equally huge
rehabilitation package give to each member of the community. Between
1972 and 1978, 588 families were shifted out of the Gir protected area.
Each relocated family was given eight acres of cultivable and grazing
land, 600 sq m of residential plot and Rs 6,050. A total of 257 families
were not shifted and there were the 87 families that returned in spite
of the relocation.
If relocation is planned yet again, the
package size will be ten scales larger than what it was in the 70s.
There is also no guarantee that the human dwellers of the forest will be
gone forever. They might wish to return to their roots as before.
It
is the same piece of land that the Maldharis and the Asiatic lions are
laying their claim on. But while for the lions, it is literally the last
place in the world to call home, for the other forest dwellers, the
timing might just be right, to understand the criticality of the
situation and willingly look for green pastures outside. It is but a
small price to pay to secure, not just their own future but also of the
land they love so much.
Source: http://www.deccanherald.com/content/279318/staking-claim-same-pie.html
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