'Tiger state': Jumbos feel at home here

Availability of space, food and water within the core area, coupled with participative management, ensure that these elephants find comfort at their new home in Umaria district, reports Anuraag Singh
'Tiger state': Jumbos feel at home here

MADHYA PRADESH: In ‘Tiger State’ Madhya Pradesh, the Bandhavgarh Tiger Reserve and National Park (BTR) has also turned out to be an ideal colony for around 50 wild elephants who arrived from Chhattisgarh in 2018. Abundance of space — 1,536 square km — food and water within the core area coupled with participative management of the tuskers by the BTR staff and villagers have ensured that these elephants did not return from their new home located in Umaria district.

The saga of the elephants’ tryst with the BTR began in 2018, when a herd of 30-plus grazing and foraging elephants travelling from adjoining Chhattisgarh entered the BTR. The initial years of this herd was really troublesome as they wreaked havoc on human dwellings. “With the elephant herd wandering in the BTR, we knew that the humans will have to learn to coexist with them. To make that happen, we needed a well-planned management model,” says BTR Deputy Director Lovit Bharti.

They started out with studying models of wild elephant management from other states such as Kerala, Karnataka, West Bengal, the northeast and Uttarakhand, says Bharti.“Then we developed our own model that was to ensure public participation,” he said. Anil Puri Goswami is one of the Rapid Response Force (RRF) guards. “Managing the villagers affected by the wandering elephant herd was more difficult than managing the elephants,” he says.

The BTR organized many workshops in association with NGOs. Gradually, the villagers came to terms with the elephants – the herd was simply looking for food and they would confront anybody who came their way.“Our model works on three key points, the Hathi Mitras (HMs), the Rapid Response Force (RRF) and nine BTR Ranges’ apparatus to deal with an emergency,” said SDO-BTR Sudhir Mishra. The management hinges on their tracking and a quick response.

The Hathi Mitra is a force of young village volunteers, with five HMs in each of the 40 villages frequented by the elephants in BTR’s core and buffer area. “Each Hathi Mitra is equipped with LED torches, special shoes, specially made mashals (torches) and crackers. They are connected 24x7 with our RRF teams through WhatsApp groups and keep sharing pinpointed locations of the elephant herd on the move,” says Mishra.

While RRF teams have to respond to help, the Hathi Mitra are the ones who manage the situation with elephants around them until the RRF personnel rush in. Therefore, the Hathi Mitra are on alert 24x7,” he says. The BTR has collaborated with NGOs like the Corbett Foundation, Last Wilderness Foundation, Wildlife Trust of India and the World Wildlife Fund. Their teams advise villagers in about 40 villages frequented by elephants. One of the suggestions is not to keep stocks of food grains (particularly rice) and mahua flowers out in the open. “The fragrance of mahua and rice attracts elephants to human settlements,” says Mishra. The results are fabulous: the BTR has managed to keep the human casualty count to one in three-and-a-half years.

As per records available at the BTR, in the initial two years, 2018-19 and 2019-20, there were at least 13-15 big incidents of loss of houses of villagers due to elephants. While cases of tuskers taking human lives and damaging properties are on the rise in districts adjoining BTR, they have now become negligible in the BTR core and buffer areas.

“Even a female elephant with its offsprings (who were part of a nine that killed five people two months back in Shahdol district) took shelter for a few days in the BTR before leaving,” Mishra said.The herd that comprised no more than 35 elephants has now grown to at least 45. “Barring two of them who are problematic, the others no longer trouble villagers,” says RRF staffer Anil Puri Goswami.

The long experience of handling tigers and related issues (there were around 130 tigers as per 2018 census at BTR) has come in handy for the BTR. “While we’ve used the same swift response apparatus like in the case of the tiger attacks, we’ve also worked as a catalyst in accelerating the process of compensation from the revenue department to those whose properties were damaged. In 2018-19 and 2019-20, the BTR worked in getting `1.25 lakh compensation to villagers,” said Mishra.

Troublesome seven now patrol BTR
“Since 2018, at least seven problematic wild elephants have been rescued from the Sanjay Dhubri Tiger Reserve in Sidhi-Shahdol. They have been successfully trained at BTR. Four of them are helping the BTR in patrolling and keeping track of the rising tiger count in the sprawling BTR, while others are doing patrolling jobs at Sanjay Dubri Tiger Reserve in Sidhi-Shahdol and the Noradehi Wildlife Sanctuary in the Bundelkhand region,” says SDO-BTR Sudhir Mishra.

Villagers get advice on keeping ’em away
The BTR has collaborated with NGOs such as The Corbett Foundation, The Last Wilderness Foundation, The Wildlife Trust of India and the World Wildlife Fund. Their teams advise residents of about 40 villages frequented by elephants. One of the suggestions is not to keep stocks of food grains and mahua flowers out in the open as their fragrance attract the herds.

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