Kishor Rithe

The Satpuras battling for tiger country, August 2001

VOL. XXI. NO. 4. August 2001

 

The Satpuras battling for tiger country

by Kishor Rithe

 

The Satpura mountain range in Central India has been identified as a TCU I (Tiger Conservation Unit) area by the Wildlife Conservation Society and the WWF. The slopes and valleys of this mountain range are home to probably the largest remaining contiguous tiger habitat in the world. Over the last year, the Nature Conservation Society, Amravati, with support from the BNHS and the US Fish & Wildlife Service, has been assessing the status and contiguity of tiger habitat in the Satpura region. The area included stretches from the Yawal Wildlife Sanctuary (Maharashtra) in the west to the Kanha Tiger Reserve (Madhya Pradesh) in the east.

 

Yawal in Jalgaon district is the southwestern tip of the Satpura range. The forests around Burhanpur in MP and near Jalgaon-Jamod (Bhingara) in the Buldhana district of Maharashtra connect Yawal to the Ambabarwa Sanctuary to the east. The Van and Narnala sanctuaries lie to the northeast of Ambabarwa. This cluster lies to the south and west of the Melghat Tiger Reserve and
is linked to it via the Paratwada, Morshi and Warud ranges of Amravati division. The Conservator of Forests, Amravati has also proposed that the Mahendri Reserve Forest in the Warud range be declared a wildlife sanctuary. Earlier, this continuity extended east to the proposed Mansinghdeo Sanctuary area, which is in turn linked with the Pench Tiger Reserve (Maharashtra).

 

However, this continuity now seems to be broken near the Saoner range. Further east, the Pench Tiger Reserve stretches across the Madhya Pradesh-Maharashtra border. The Rukhad Sanctuary in MP adjacent to Pench extends the tiger’s habitat towards the Balaghat district, while the forests of Mogarkasa in the Ramtek range and north Bhandara (the Koka forest) connect to the Nagzira Sanctuary. This tiger habitat links with the Balaghat forest, which is adjacent to the Kanha Tiger Reserve.

 

The findings

 

There is still viable tiger habitat continuity between the Yawal-Ambabarwa-Van-Narnala-Gugamal-Melghat-Mahendri belt and the compact tiger habitat of Mansinghdeo-Pench(Mah.)-Pench(MP)-Rukhad-Kanha forest belt through an important wildlife corridor formed by the Satpura National Park and the Pachmarhi and Bori sanctuaries in Chindwara district. This links the Melghat cluster through the forest of west and south Betul with the Pench-Kanha cluster through the south and east Chindwara forests.

 

This is probably the single largest continuous tiger belt in the world and includes 14 existing PAs (covering 6,488 sq. km.) as well as two proposed PAs (200 sq. km.) This total tiger belt spreads over 10,000 sq. km. of forest. As such, its protection and, where necessary, regeneration are vital in the battle to save the tiger from extinction.

There are two probable breakages to the continuity near Saoner and near southwest Seoni due to the construction of a dam. We are presently in the process of mapping these areas to ascertain how these corridors are best re-established, where possible.

 

The process of mapping habitat continuity has also yielded information with regard to the threats that these areas face. From mega projects, felling by the forest department itself in areas under the Territorial Wing and by the Forest Development Corporation of Maharashtra (FDCM) to poaching, a number of forces conspire to split the Satpura tiger habitat into small compartments with little or no connectivity between them.

 

Damming the tiger

 

The Chikaldhara Pumped Storage Project: This proposed project on the boundary of the Melghat Tiger Reserve threatens to drown over 100 hectares of tiger habitat. The area is prime deciduous forest and is frequented by both tigers and leopards. Though the River Valleys Expert Committee of the Ministry of Environment and Forests has rejected the project thrice in the past six years, political pressure is being brought to bear once again on the MoEF to reconsider its position. Continued monitoring of this proposal is essential to ensure that it is not passed.

 

The Upper Tapi Stage II Project: A second dam is also being proposed in Melghat – the Upper Tapi Stage II Project, which threatens to drown another 244 ha. of tiger reserve area and an additional 1,673 ha. of forest land in Maharashtra, including a part of the denotified portions of the Melghat Sanctuary. The areas concerned were deleted from the Melghat Sanctuary in 1994, perhaps in order to facilitate the construction of the dam. Another 4,348 ha. of forest land in MP will also be submerged.

 

The area due to be submerged in both the Chaurakund and Dharni ranges is rich in flora and fauna. Tiger, leopard and dhole are the main predator species in this range; sloth bear, spotted deer, sambar, four-horned antelope and barking deer are also found here.

 

Perhaps, more importantly, corridors between the Chaurakund range (the area deleted from the sanctuary in 1994) and the Bhainsdehi range of the South Betul division in Madhya Pradesh, to the east of Chaurakund and across the Tapi river, will also be severed by the reservoir formed by the dam.

 

The dam itself will be constructed near Gutighat/Chether village in Maharashtra where the Sipna river meets the Tapi. The resulting reservoir will break the continuity between the Motigarh Reserve Forest in MP (which is linked to the Yawal Sanctuary) and the Tapi Reserve Forest in Maharashtra.

 

The Bawanthdi dam (Rajiv Sagar Interstate Irrigation Project): The location of the dam, the resultant reservoir and some of its canals are in the corridors connecting Pench to the Nagzira Sanctuary. Tiger habitat continuity between the Pench Tiger Reserve in the Satpura range (both in Maharashtra and MP) with the Kanha Tiger Reserve in the Maycal range is through this forest belt in the northwest Balaghat forest. These corridors will be almost totally destroyed by this project, which envisages the construction of a 348 m. high dam and over 100 km. of canals. An estimated 2,350 ha. of forest land will be lost in both states and 11 villages will be displaced.

 

Denotification

 

The denotification of around 500 sq. km. of the Melghat Wildlife Sanctuary in 1994 has drastically reduced the level of protection afforded to this area, with repercussions on the sanctuary itself.
Even though the area remains under Project Tiger, it is accorded least priority. Consequent to the denotification, several activities have taken place in the reserve that are not in the best interests of wildlife protection. A road-building contract was issued in 1996 to build hard-top roads leading to all the Korku villages inside the tiger reserve. This is believed to have violated the provisions of the Forest Conservation Act, 1980. The roads have opened up the reserve to illegal timber extractors, poachers, miners, encroachers, etc. Poaching incidents have risen sharply in the last few years, as has the number of animals killed by poisoning waterholes and carcasses.

 

It has now become clear that one of the purposes of denotifying the sanctuary was to allow logging operations and provide employment to the 39 villages in the denotified area. While making life easier for the 39 villages in the area was the reason given for the denotification, the real agenda was to facilitate logging, road building and the Upper Tapi dam. Contractors and crooked politicians stand to make money from each of these projects, none of which would have been possible if the area had still remained under sanctuary status.

 

21 villages still remain inside the sanctuary area. Many of the villagers are now asking for the government to rehabilitate them outside the sanctuary, so that they can avail of modern amenities. Villages in the denotified area are not entitled to any rehabilitation package. Thus it is better to renotify the area and also give these 39 villages too the option of a satisfactory rehabilitation for those who want it.

 

The Collector, in consultation with the Chief Wildlife Warden, can allow certain rights to continue in a sanctuary under Section 24 of the Wildlife (Protection) Act, 1972. Thus the area can be given sanctuary status once again, the villagers’ rights can be recognised and the rehabilitation option will be open to those who want it. Clearly the denotification has not served any purpose, rather it has had a negative effect on wildlife.

 

The Maharashtra State Wildlife Advisory Board, on March 10, 2001, had recommended that the government constitute a committee to decide whether it is essential to reincorporate the area into the sanctuary. At the meeting of this committee at Kolkhaz Tahsil, Chikaldhara on February 20, 2001, a majority of the members, including local politicians and NGOs, asked for the renotification of the sanctuary.

 

Aside from these larger issues, encroachment also threatens the contiguity of habitat at many places, including near the Ambabarwa Sanctuary at Bhingara in Jalgaon, Jamod tahsil in Buldhana district. Melghat too is plagued with the problem of encroachment on forest land. If the Upper Tapi project is allowed to come through, high yielding agricultural land will be submerged, leading to still more encroachment on forest lands.

 

The wildlife trade

 

Apart from tiger skin and other derivatives, the illegal trade in deer antlers is also a problem in the area. On May 12, 2001, the forest department seized 127 bags of antlers in Nagpur, said to be the largest seizure in India. From February to June 2001, in Maharashtra, we lost 11 tigers, six leopards, five gaur, one chital, one sambar, one sloth bear, one civet, two peacocks, in addition to unrecorded deaths. Many of these were from the Satpuras. Poaching is on the increase and is becoming a serious problem in these areas. In fact, guns are manufactured within the Ambabarwa Sanctuary itself!

 

Faulty working plans

 

The wildlife corridors under discussion are with the territorial divisions and the FDCM, and have to undergo working plan prescriptions. Very few of these areas have good working plans that are wildlife conservation oriented. And where there are good working plans, these are not implemented, with the result that the majority of these areas are under logging operations and coup working. The FDCM is against the protection of these corridors and has in places clear-felled forests for plantations!

 

Successful relocation

 

One of the notable successes in Melghat has been the satisfactory rehabilitation of Bori village, the first from the Melghat Sanctuary to be relocated. This is the culmination of a process that took several years, starting from initial reports that the villagers wanted to move out of the sanctuary. These reports were then verified independently. After many meetings and discussions between local villagers, the forest department, wildlife and human rights’ NGOs and government officials, a detailed rehabilitation package was drawn up. The village is now completely resettled at Rajura Girwarpur in Akot tahsil of Akola district in the Satpura range and after initial problems were resolved, the villagers are now satisfied with the quality of their rehabilitation. Villagers from Koha have also taken possession of their new plots at Rajura Girwarpur. The next three villages, Vairat, Pastlai and Churni have also identified land near Ghatladki in Amravati district and the process of attaining land clearance is underway. If the rehabilitation of these villages is monitored and guided as closely as the Bori rehabilitation was, there is no reason why they too should not be successful.

 

Caption

 

1. The Satpuras and its adjoining forests probably constitute the world’s largest contiguous tiger habitat. Maintaining corridors between Protected Areas in this belt will determine the future of tigers and other wildlife in the region.

2. The Bawanthdi dam, still under construction, will sever corridors between Nagzira, Kanha and Pench. The project must be halted at its present height as water from the nearby Pench Hydroelectric Project can meet all irrigation needs.

3. This tiger valley, four kilometres from the Melghat Tiger Reserve, would have been submerged by the Chikaldhara Project. The project has been rejected by the Ministry of Environment thrice, but continues to be a threat.

4. Logging by the forest department’s Territorial Wing threatens the viability of many connecting corridors. Inappropriate management plans in forests outside Protected Areas pose a major problem throughout the Satpuras.

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