PATNA: Bihar's deputy chief minister Sushil Kumar Modi on Monday observed the world Tiger day with a difference.
The deputy CM, who also holds the additional charge of forest and environment department, named a baby giraffe and a baby zebra as 'Heema' and 'Babli' respectively. Modi named the baby animals at a function organised at Sanjay Gandhi Biological Park.
Speaking as the chief guest, Modi said that Valmiki Tiger Reserve in Bettiah has registered an encouraging rise in the number of tigers from 8 in 2010 to 28 in 2014 and 31 in 2018. Quoting official figures, he said: “as many as 45,424 tourists visited the Valmiki Nagar Tiger Reserve in 2018-19 compared to the total number of 10,407 visitors registered in 2017-18”.
He further added that officials have now set a target to welcome one lakh tourists in the tiger reserve in the next tourist season. Besides all this, he said that the state government is working on creating both a Nature Safari (NS) and the Zoo-Safari (ZS) at an estimated cost of Rs 176 crore in Rajgir district in order to explore nature-tourisms in the state.
Modi also inaugurated a trackless toy-train in the zoo and said that the biological park registered a footfall of more than 24.33 lakh visitors in 2018-19 yielding a handsome revenue to the tune of Rs 8.66 lakh.