http://www.telegraph.co.uk/earth/wildlife/5850187/Just-1000-tigers-left-in-India.html
Only a year ago there were calculated to be 24 tigers in the park, one of India’s 27 tiger reserves.
A century ago, India had about 40,000 tigers. By 1988, as a result of extensive hunting and poaching, there were just 4,500 left. Now the true figure is probably 1,000.
Panna, located near Khajuraho, is the second reserve in which there are now no tigers. Sariska National Park in Rajasthan lost all its tigers in 2005.
The decline is said to be largely down to poachers serving an insatiable demand for tiger bones, claws and skin in China, Taiwan and Korea, where they are used in traditional medicine. Other factors include electric fences erected by farmers, illegal logging and fights between male tigers over diminishing territory.
Several years ago I visited the forests of Bandhavgarh National Park, a few hours’ drive from Panna in remote Madhya Pradesh . The park contains about 45 tigers and offers the best chance in the world of seeing these kings of the jungle in the wild.
I saw six different tigers, including a magnificent young male. I followed through the jungle on the back of an elephant as the tiger marked his range. Eventually he strolled right up to us and dropped at our feet. It was a moving experience – his black-striped pelt was beautiful, so shiny and silken, his paws were huge, the size of dinner plates, and his large yellow eyes seemed to look straight through us. He was too young to fear, too old to be shy. Now he may be dead.
Even at relatively well-run Bandhavgarh there has been poaching. Just before my visit a gang had been caught with seven tiger skins. I was told that the men involved were from Tamil Nadu in the south and that they had struck – with local help – on the orders of a Nepalese-based gang.
It was said that the villager who led the poachers to the tigers was paid £100 for his services – a sum it is hard to resist in what is one of the poorest parts of rural India.
An official government census of the tiger population in all India’s reserves is being carried out this October; the results could make very sad reading.
(Note: This is the 'new number' given to the tiger population in India by the conservationists and international media. Earlier it was said that there had been 40,000 tigers in the country which declined to 1400 in 2007 as per the camera trap method estimation jointly done by NTCA and WII. Now it is said that there had been 1,00,000 tigers in India centuries back which has now come down to 1000. Is it true that only 1000 tigers are left in a vast country with 23% of total geographical area under forests. Only 1000 tigers left in our wilderness including tiger reserves??? It sounds frightening. It is more frightening when some people guess it even lesser. Are we going to loose all our tigers in wilderness in the next coming decade? This situation is extremely challenging. Efforts are continuously made from all possible quarters, but there is something missing... perhaps the spirit.....spirit to save 'our tigers'..........one of the most fascinating flagship species of 'our country'............our 'national animal'. It is a war like situation, as I strongly feel now and then...........but do we really have warriors??--Ramesh Pandey)
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