December 8, 2019, 6:52 pm IST
Samir Shukla in
Science Nomad |
India |
TOI
Though the news hasn’t really managed to grab
the headlines, but recent gruesome human deaths taking place in India
are not restricted to Hyderabad where human-animals were found to be
preying, they are also haunting rural areas of Gujarat.
The human-animals raped, burnt and killed, and then are shot down like vermin, but the real animals who are bringing equally brutal death to poor farmers are yet to treat using the same natural justice logic recently invented by Indian social media experts.
At this very hour, a large team of forest officials (before the wildlife lovers jump the gun, I clarify that they armed with a tranquiliser gun as far as I know) are combing a rural area of Amreli district where a man-eater leopard has terrorised the local population since a week.
The news stories of the attacks of this leopard have a chilling Corbett-ian feel to them as it has entered a hut by breaking through the roof and fearlessly jumped in to grab its victim by the neck while other occupiers were screaming. In other instance, a farmer who was sleeping outside his hut was picked up and dragged away into the forest, and his body was torn apart and preyed upon by the cat.
This leopard story is neither first nor unique, as Gujarat records man-eater and man-killer leopards in almost every part of the state, more so in areas where sugarcane cultivation attracts female leopards to use them as nurseries, but they are all brushed aside as man-animal conflicts caused by loss of habitat of wild animals (that humans are guilty of).
While the urban wildlife lovers go ecstatic on sighting a leopard and post even out-of-focus images as “most cherished moment of my life”, and get responded to with a hundred “how lucky” comments, this most adaptive of big cats is actually colonising more and more areas thanks to the public adulation and legal protection it is getting today.
https://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/blogs/science-nomad/man-eaters-of-gujarat-a-toxic-love-affair-about-to-get-sour/
The leopard problem is here and is slowly growing but there is something a lot bigger looming ahead, and when it breaks, the even greater tragedy is likely to occur.
Gujarat is now sitting on a time-bomb thanks to a really toxic love affair wildlife lovers have with a wild cat that has now turned the habitat-encroachment issue on its head and has started moving into human territory.
The Gir lion, the pride of Gujarat is actually overflowing out of Gir forest and has started doing what all life forms do, i.e. colonise new areas. Very recently a small group of lions was found to have travelled to Chotila, an area that is almost a hundred kilometres from Gir lion’s “natural” range, and this journey was celebrated on social media platform as good news.
If social media data is crunched, it is clear that there is a massive increase in posts containing videos of lions roaming on streets of villages and small towns, not just in Gir but in other revenue areas. It is clear that lions are moving out, and people are loving it.
Gir lion has co-existed with humans in a relatively balanced way inside the Gir region where it has adapted to using cattle as the primary prey, and thanks to government protection and compensation policies, this has worked in favour of all stakeholders. So, there is a general benign-ness observed in the local lion population and the cat is taken for granted by humans living alongside it.
This strange man-lion comfort is not only treated as a virtue, but from documentaries to social media posts, there is an atmosphere of placidity created around the Gir lion, as if it is not a large cat capable of killing a human being with one blow of its paw, but a friendly large kitten that can be safely allowed to roam the streets.
While people are overflowing with the love for the lion, it is moving out of the (scrub) forest and settling on revenue land, a move that should have sent alarm bells ringing, but instead is looked at as a mark of success of the protection policies.
As the idea of man-eating has a very archaic air about it, wildlife lovers seem to be living under an illusion that it is not real.
This illusion is possibly strengthened by a strange quirk in animal behaviour that it is possible to safely watch even the deadliest of the cats from the comforts of an open Gypsy, so most wildlife lovers who live in the glittering cities, and move around photographing lions and tigers during day time fail to realise what meeting the same cat would feel like if one is on foot and in dark, a situation that a rural Indian deals regularly within many parts of India.
While animals are suffering from massive loss of habitat and need all the help they can get, but in case of leopards and now Gir lions, there is a need to wake up to a reality that the day is not far when people will end up dying thanks to this delusional love that wildlife lovers are suffering from.
From marauding rogue leopards to roaming lions, they must be recognised to be large cats that can and have killed humans. So, if they move out of the restricted and controlled areas, it is a matter as serious as a serial killer roaming loose amongst people.
There is no practical way for humans and large cats to coexist without a one-sided outcome of the weaker of the two getting killed at some point.
If forest departments of India are planning to look at social media and wildlife lovers as the peer group to satisfy, the cost of this stupidity will be paid by the poor rural people of India who will end up getting forced to live alongside deadly animals and end up dying horrible deaths.
Wildlife management and Jeev Daya or PETA are mutually exclusive, and if the administration is going to try and satisfy the empathy agenda, we are just waiting for a tragedy to occur in Gujarat sooner than later.
The human-animals raped, burnt and killed, and then are shot down like vermin, but the real animals who are bringing equally brutal death to poor farmers are yet to treat using the same natural justice logic recently invented by Indian social media experts.
At this very hour, a large team of forest officials (before the wildlife lovers jump the gun, I clarify that they armed with a tranquiliser gun as far as I know) are combing a rural area of Amreli district where a man-eater leopard has terrorised the local population since a week.
The news stories of the attacks of this leopard have a chilling Corbett-ian feel to them as it has entered a hut by breaking through the roof and fearlessly jumped in to grab its victim by the neck while other occupiers were screaming. In other instance, a farmer who was sleeping outside his hut was picked up and dragged away into the forest, and his body was torn apart and preyed upon by the cat.
This leopard story is neither first nor unique, as Gujarat records man-eater and man-killer leopards in almost every part of the state, more so in areas where sugarcane cultivation attracts female leopards to use them as nurseries, but they are all brushed aside as man-animal conflicts caused by loss of habitat of wild animals (that humans are guilty of).
While the urban wildlife lovers go ecstatic on sighting a leopard and post even out-of-focus images as “most cherished moment of my life”, and get responded to with a hundred “how lucky” comments, this most adaptive of big cats is actually colonising more and more areas thanks to the public adulation and legal protection it is getting today.
https://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/blogs/science-nomad/man-eaters-of-gujarat-a-toxic-love-affair-about-to-get-sour/
The leopard problem is here and is slowly growing but there is something a lot bigger looming ahead, and when it breaks, the even greater tragedy is likely to occur.
Gujarat is now sitting on a time-bomb thanks to a really toxic love affair wildlife lovers have with a wild cat that has now turned the habitat-encroachment issue on its head and has started moving into human territory.
The Gir lion, the pride of Gujarat is actually overflowing out of Gir forest and has started doing what all life forms do, i.e. colonise new areas. Very recently a small group of lions was found to have travelled to Chotila, an area that is almost a hundred kilometres from Gir lion’s “natural” range, and this journey was celebrated on social media platform as good news.
If social media data is crunched, it is clear that there is a massive increase in posts containing videos of lions roaming on streets of villages and small towns, not just in Gir but in other revenue areas. It is clear that lions are moving out, and people are loving it.
Gir lion has co-existed with humans in a relatively balanced way inside the Gir region where it has adapted to using cattle as the primary prey, and thanks to government protection and compensation policies, this has worked in favour of all stakeholders. So, there is a general benign-ness observed in the local lion population and the cat is taken for granted by humans living alongside it.
This strange man-lion comfort is not only treated as a virtue, but from documentaries to social media posts, there is an atmosphere of placidity created around the Gir lion, as if it is not a large cat capable of killing a human being with one blow of its paw, but a friendly large kitten that can be safely allowed to roam the streets.
While people are overflowing with the love for the lion, it is moving out of the (scrub) forest and settling on revenue land, a move that should have sent alarm bells ringing, but instead is looked at as a mark of success of the protection policies.
As the idea of man-eating has a very archaic air about it, wildlife lovers seem to be living under an illusion that it is not real.
This illusion is possibly strengthened by a strange quirk in animal behaviour that it is possible to safely watch even the deadliest of the cats from the comforts of an open Gypsy, so most wildlife lovers who live in the glittering cities, and move around photographing lions and tigers during day time fail to realise what meeting the same cat would feel like if one is on foot and in dark, a situation that a rural Indian deals regularly within many parts of India.
While animals are suffering from massive loss of habitat and need all the help they can get, but in case of leopards and now Gir lions, there is a need to wake up to a reality that the day is not far when people will end up dying thanks to this delusional love that wildlife lovers are suffering from.
From marauding rogue leopards to roaming lions, they must be recognised to be large cats that can and have killed humans. So, if they move out of the restricted and controlled areas, it is a matter as serious as a serial killer roaming loose amongst people.
There is no practical way for humans and large cats to coexist without a one-sided outcome of the weaker of the two getting killed at some point.
If forest departments of India are planning to look at social media and wildlife lovers as the peer group to satisfy, the cost of this stupidity will be paid by the poor rural people of India who will end up getting forced to live alongside deadly animals and end up dying horrible deaths.
Wildlife management and Jeev Daya or PETA are mutually exclusive, and if the administration is going to try and satisfy the empathy agenda, we are just waiting for a tragedy to occur in Gujarat sooner than later.
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