CALLING ALL SANCTUARY READERS!
We encourage you to sign this letter to the Prime Minister.

Dear Dr. Manmohan Singh:
Our national animal, the tiger, is our pride and protecting it is our duty. In the 1970s, Mrs. Indira Gandhi was acknowledged by the world to have saved the tiger in India. Today, we are in a similar situation where only a leader of great foresight and true patriotism can make a difference. Please call for an emergency meeting of the National Wildlife Board so that instant action to implement the five-step formula given below to staunch the tigers slide and to work towards a recovery.

1. Rescind the Forest Rights Act, 2006: Forests, wildlife, rivers and catchment areas are poised to be lost forever in the massive land transfer of India’s forests if the Act is implemented in its current form. It is the rural and forest poor that will be hit hardest when forests, rivers and soils are degraded. Every forest or Protected Area that is populated by tigers should be made off-limits to the Forest Rights Act and to commercial projects. Not a single tree must be cut without the permission of the forest department and wildlife crimes must be seriously penalised. Forest dwellers must be encouraged to migrate outwards to less ecologically-sensitive areas by offering them truly attractive relocation packages. The Wildlife (Protection) Act and Forest Conservation Act must be strengthened and not diluted. If locals are made the first beneficiaries of the profitability of forests, whether Protected Areas or Reserved forests, they will feel invested in protection of natural assets. Those healthy natural assets will ensure alternative, sustainable, local, income models that will allow residents to literally earn a return on conservation. Even as humans are able to improve the quality of their own lives, wild animals would be more secure.

2. Focus on forest departments: Forest department personnel must be treated on par with India’s armed forces. India currently has 90 national parks and 501 sanctuaries. They account for just 4.7 per cent of our land area. Throughout the country, forest guards who risk their lives to defend its tigers live in abject poverty with little support. They have inadequate clothing, inappropriate shoes and no weapons to protect themselves or enforce anti-poaching laws. They have no binoculars, field guides or any other tools to execute their jobs with efficiency and dignity. Both central and state governments must allocate the resources necessary to bring operation and management of PAs up to the highest standards, including recruiting younger field staff and trained locals.

3. Address habitat fragmentation: India’s tiger habitat is like a frayed, patchwork quilt. Most of the reserves are small and fragmented, literally like islands. This leaves them vulnerable to local extinction. When tigers wander from their limited territories into human habitations, they are killed. Protection must be stepped up in existing PAs and reserves must be connected to one another so that tigers have larger populations and areas to hunt and breed.

4. Address climate change: India is likely to be hit particularly hard and early by climate change. India’s greenhouse gas emissions could increase to 3,000 million tones by 2020, twice the emission level in 2000. Tiger forests could be our biggest ally in the battle against climate change. Our economic system fails to capture the values of carbon storage, water purification, biodiversity, and other ‘ecosystem services’ provided by forests including eco-tourism. More than 300 rivers originate in tiger reserves. The survival of the tiger is directly related to our water and food security.

5. Get serious about poaching: The Wildlife Crime Bureau must be made effective by strengthening and staffing it with professionals. Strong anti-poaching units must be deployed on the frontlines which can work with trusted local community members who could provide information and field strength. Hunting tribes must be offered rehabilitation and alternative livelihoods away from tiger habitats.

Yours sincerely,

The Vanishing Stripes

Project Tiger, which was once led by brave and capable people such as Kailash Sankhala, now suffers from a leadership crisis. The latest news is that we have fewer wild tigers alive today than on the day Project Tiger was started in 1973. This is a matter of great shame for all those whose responsibility it was to save the cat, including our Prime Minister and the Chief Ministers of states in which tigers are found. The many conservationists and large NGOs will also be blamed by the future generation for failing the tiger. In truth, all of India itself has failed the tiger.

Why are things suddenly so bad for the tiger?
It has not been sudden. Tiger numbers have fallen gradually each year since 1990. India now has less than 1,500 tigers left alive. This means we have lost over 2,300 tigers in the last five years. You can see the Ministry of Environment and Forests’ (MoEF) press release at http://pib.nic.in/release/release.asp?relid=35336

Who is killing our tigers?
Poachers of course. But large companies that mine or dam forests in which tigers live and who profit from the sale of trees are equally guilty. In fact, destroying the forest is the surest way to wipe out tigers forever.

Who is financing the poachers?
International crime syndicates and gangs are financing people to kill tigers, elephants, rhinos and almost any other species that can be sold for cash. Even the famous Kaziranga National Park has not been spared. Here, we have lost over 20 rhinos in 2007.

What does the latest report by the National Tiger Conservation Authority say?
In 1973, when the number of tigers in India was estimated to be just over 1,700, the whole world said that tigers were in grave danger and Project Tiger was launched. The new report from the National Tiger Conservation Authority suggests that in some tiger reserves such as Corbett, Kaziranga, Nagarahole, Kanha and Tadoba, the tiger is safe, but outside such protected forests and in forests where human beings still live, tigers have almost vanished, or are likely to vanish in a very short while. The report says that today we may have less than 1,500 tigers left alive. The fact is that tigers are relatively safe in those reserves where there are no humans or very few humans. In others, such as Palamau and Namdapha, they have virtually been wiped out. In 2004, Sariska lost all its tigers. In Panna, not a single tiger cub has been born seen since 2002 and over 50 per cent of the park seems to have no tigers at all. There was one breeding tigress in there, but even she has been missing since the middle of 2007. Late last year, traps and snares were discovered in the core area of the Kanha Tiger Reserve in Madhya Pradesh where everyone thought the cats were totally safe. Tiger skins regularly end up in shipments of wildlife contraband bound for far-eastern countries, including China, Japan and Hong Kong.

What are the other threats to the tiger?
Almost every forest in India is under attack from agriculture, cattle grazing and commercial projects including dams, coal mines, four-lane highways, thermal plants, cement factories, steel plants, ports and even nuclear reactors. Those who truly love wildlife are not empowered to save the tiger and those in whose hands we have left the tiger seem not to care about the cat.

What is wrong with the Forest Rights Act?
With this dangerous new law in place, people have already started moving into wildlife areas to cut down trees and claim land. This will not only result in the death of tigers and other wildlife, but will make our existing climate change problem even worse. Over 25 per cent of all the greenhouse gasses released by India are a result of deforestation. This situation will worsen and, potentially, 7.5 gigatonnes of carbon dioxide could be spewed into the air. This will also affect our lakes and rivers and, therefore, our agriculture.

Can’t the MoEF do anything?
That is what they were set up to do, but instead of protecting forests, the ministry has become a tool in the hands of politicians who ‘somehow’ manage to convince the ministry to approve very destructive industrial projects. Over 15,000 hectares of forest land was destroyed with their permission for 49 industrial projects, including mining, irrigation and windmills. This could mean cutting down around three million trees. Additionally, lakhs of trees are being cut for state and central government projects that need 40 hectares of land or less.

What can an individual do?
To start with, write a letter to the Prime Minister. Also write to newspapers, Chief Ministers, Forest Ministers and government officials and speak to friends and teachers. Print out these pages and ask your principal to highlight the issue during your school assembly. Ask them to write to Bittu Sahgal, Editor, Sanctuary Magazine, if they need any clarification, or if they need help to run their campaigns locally.

Can you help?
Yes. You can be a part of the Sanctuary-NDTV ‘Save the Tiger’ Campaign. We want to collect one million signatures to save the tiger, so we can convince our Prime Minister to act before it is too late. We want the Prime Minister to hold an emergency meeting of the National Board for Wildlife to consider the latest threat to the tiger. Watch NDTV for more news on our campaign. THE TIGER NEEDS YOU NOW. We do not want any more promises. We want action and we want it now.