Henceforth, only those victims of human-elephant conflicts having Aadhaar number will get compensation under the Project Elephant.
The Centrally sponsored scheme of ‘Project Elephant’ is carried out by the State Governments with the primary goal to offer monetary and technical assist to the Elephant Range States of India for the safety of elephants, their habitats and hall, to fight the difficulty of human-animal battle and welfare of the captive elephants.
“The scheme provides for ex-gratia payment for loss of life or injury, damage to property or crop, etc., and also rewards the informers and payment of expenses on intelligence gathering respectively to the villagers, farmers, and other individuals,” a senior Ministry official said..
“In case, any individual does not have Aadhaar at that point of time, he or she will need to enrol and offer proof of registration,” the official stated adding that in case of individuals joining our training programmes, too would need Aadhaar card and if not, would need to enrol for it.”
Human-elephant conflict caused 1,401 human and 301 elephant deaths in India from 2018-2020, Bhupendra Yadav, Union minister for environment, forest and climate had told the Rajya Sabha last August. Some 115 elephants and 457 people died in 2018-19, while 99 elephants and 585 people died in 2019-20. In 2020-21 (upto December 2020), 87 elephants and 359 people lost their lives in human-elephant conflict.
The Ministry doles out monetary help as ex-gratia reduction of Rs 5 lakh in case of demise or everlasting incapacitation to a human; Rs 2 lakh for grievous damage; Rs 25,000 per particular person as price of remedy for minor damage. The compensation for lack of property / crops are paid by the states / UTs as per norms prescribed.