Home

Back to Index

Indian tiger census delayed

     New Delhi: The Indian Government will take at least another 14 months to complete the first "scientific" count of Tigers in the country. According to the Ministry of Environment and Forests, the Rs.13- crore tiger census project has run into controversy after an international team of experts questioned the process of counting that has been adopted. The counting process has been on since January 2005 and it was supposed to be completed by July this year.

    According to reports on missing tigers last year, there is still no answer as to the number of tigers alive or dead. The last census counted 3,600 tigers, but some wildlife experts say that may be below 1500. Conclusions reached by the team of experts led by John Seidensticker, one of the world's most revered tiger experts, claim that there are gaping holes in the method of counting and an unhealthy dependence on surveyors who may have questionable "integrity". After surveying census operations in seven tiger reserves, including Corbett (Uttaranchal) and Valmiki (Bihar), Seidensticker and his team have filed their report with the Government and the World Conservation Union which monitors conservation protocols across the world. According to the Indian Express, the key points in the report are as follows: The Ministry dispensed with the "pugmark" counting method claiming it was prone to human error. And introduced what it called a "peer-reviewed, scientific" method under which counting involves several stages, use of cameras, testing of DNA samples and mapping tiger density using GIS (geographic information systems). Seidensticker's report says that this method, too, relies on the "integrity of the primary data collectors, data compilers and their supervisors." The genetic methods proposed in the census, the report says, "have not been fully developed for this application". There are not enough GPS (global positioning system) sets to map out the terrain as per the methodology.

     The census's feasibility is in doubt given that more than 40,000 forest units will have to be sampled, 20% of this area in the North-East. "Implementation is an enormous undertaking...there is also no detailed write-up of the technical analysis, explicitly identifying the analytical techniques to be used in each phase of the framework.'' The census has no provision for tracking the number of poaching incidents and other "human-caused" mortality. Evidence of how unwieldy the new process has become comes from Project Tiger director Rajesh Gopal's communication to Seidensticker, quoted in his report. Gopal assured the team that the final "population estimation of tigers (would be ready by) July 2006." This is contradicted by today's announcement. One key reason is death by poaching. This is echoed by Seidensticker in his report: "A substantive deficiency noted in the (counting) framework...is the absence of tiger mortality monitoring." The Ministry claims that data from states is being processed at the Wildlife Institute of India. Says institute director P R Sinha: "Most of the states are sitting on (the data). The DG (forest) is pushing them hard to comply over the next two weeks." There is a bizarre official explanation for why the data collected in January-February hasn't been computed yet. "State official have technical problem with the software (read modified excel sheets) we sent," says Gopal. This after there was elaborate training before the census began.
-May 18, 2006

Leading Indian News Papers

Overseas Tourist
Offices

Tourist offices
in India

Helpline