On July 29, 2019, Prime Minister Narendra Modi released the All India Tiger Estimation Report 2018. He lauded the conservation efforts and ...
On July 29, 2019, Prime Minister Narendra Modi released the All India Tiger Estimation Report 2018. He lauded the conservation efforts and noted that the tiger population in India stood at 2,967. India, he declared, “is one of the world’s biggest and most secure habitats”. Only 15 years ago, such a statement would have been unimaginable, given the extinction of tigers in the Sariska Tiger Reserve in Rajasthan in 2004.
Following the Sariska debacle, the government of India took several steps to conserve the tiger population. The Wildlife Institute of India carried out a country-level tiger census to survey tiger habitats, estimate the tigers’ population, and assess their prey and habitats. India’s growing economy and the stricter wildlife protection laws have led to an increase in the tiger population. The 2018 figure of 2,967 was the culmination of those efforts, doubling the total from 1,411 in 2006 to 2,967 in 2018.
While tiger protection falls under one of the 17 United Nations Sustainable Development Goals, the government of India’s efforts to conserve tigers and minimise conflicts with people have, in truth, provided mixed results. Only nine months before this report was released, a tigress named Avni was shot dead because she had become...
