Clearing the air over Palamu Tiger Reserve (PTR) not having any tigers, the officials of State Forest Department on Monday informed that they have an evidence of at least three tigers being in the reserve as of now.
The Status of Tigers in India report 2019 released by Prime Minister Narendra Modi on July 29 showed that while there are five tigers in Jharkhand, none of them have been spotted at PTR.Additional Chief Secretary of Forest, Environment and Climate Change Department, Indu Shekhar Chaturvedi informed that there has been sighting of three tigers, two male and one female in the PTR from February till date, which has been captured in the camera traps.
The official informed that while 85 per cent of tracking is done by camera traps the rest are done by indirect methods like pug marks and scat.
The officials of forest department informed that the survey was conducted between the period of June to October 2018 in which indirect method of tracking was used as the camera traps were installed in PTR only after September.
“During this time marks of five tigers were found, one near Hazaribag and four on the south eastern side of PTR. However, after the camera traps were installed now we have concrete evidence of at least three tigers in PTR,” Chaturvedi said.The secretary also informed that as there has been evidence of tiger movement near Hazaribag, the department is planning on improvement of entire zone from Hazaribag, Chatra, Latehar, Lohardaga and further up to Chhattisgarh as the area is considered a tiger habitat.
Talking about steps taken to ensure that tigers are not disturbed at PTR during combing operations by the armed forces so that they are not forced to migrate, Chaturvedi said, “We keep organizing meetings with the commandants of the local camps in the area to sensitize them about organizing silent operations. Also, we are ourselves focusing to ensure that our patrolling is also silent and based on intelligence rather than manual.