There seems to be no end of poaching of one-horned rhinos in Assam. Despite intensified operations for over a week, poachers have killed this year's tenth one-horned rhino in Assam's Orang national park, located in Darrang District of northern Assam.
The incident came to the fore only on Thursday, when the guards patrolling the park recovered a carcass with its horn missing. The rhino carcass, which was recovered in semi decomposed state, bore bullet marks, the officials said.
Prior to this, the poachers have killed two one-horned rhinos in Assam's famous Kaziranga National Park within a span of one week. Out of the two rhinos, one was killed when the State Environment and Forest Minister Pramila Rani Brahma was camping in the park, reviewing anti-poaching measures and discussing strategies to stop poaching. While this is the tenth one-horned rhino killed since January this year, this is also the third rhino to be killed by poachers after the new Government led by BJP took over in the State. It may be mentioned here that BJP had campaigned aggressively on the failure of the previous Government to stop poaching and assured that they would take strong measures to stop poaching once they are voted to power.
It may be mentioned here that Orang national park has over 100 rhinos according to the census carried out in 2011. The park is known for its good rhino conservation measures and this is the first rhino to be killed after December 2014.
The BJP-led Assam Government, which had campaigned aggressively on the issue of rhino poaching before coming to power in the Assembly polls held in April this year, had taken up several steps to stop the poaching.
Government had shifted the office of the Principal Chief Conservator of Forests (PCCF) to Kaziranga national park from Guwahati.