With increasing possibility of Kaziranga National Park being inundated by the raging Brahmaputra River, the Centre for Wildlife Rehabilitation and Conservation (CWRC) — an International Fund for Animal Welfare-Wildlife Trust of India (IFAW-WTI) run wildlife welfare centre — has started pre-flood awareness campaign for the safety of wildlife in the fringe villages of this world heritage site.
While the first wave of floods that hit the State about a week back — flooding 16 districts and affecting over 3 lakh population — have started receding, fear looms large as the State witnesses at least three wave of deluge every year. Some part of the national park of Assam are still submerged due to flood waters.
“The flood in the national park is essential from the ecological point of view as it cleans the park by washing away the unwanted plants, seeds and roots. However, the deluge is also the time when the poachers take advantage, particularly on the one-horned rhinos,” said Deputy Director of the WTI, Rathin Barman.
He said, with support of Kaziranga forest authority two awareness meetings for residents of six villages in the fringe areas have already been organised in central and eastern range of the park. More such meetings for wildlife protection during floods will be held to cover the entire Kaziranga-Karbi Anglong landscape, he said.
During high floods, the wildlife of the park moves towards the highland and hill ranges of Karbi Anglong crossing the National Highway 37 that bifurcates the park. This national highway often proves a death trap for many animals due to speeding vehicles that ply through the NH-37, particularly at night.
“Involvement of the locals is a must for success of conservation and by engaging the local youth, we could not only help the animals during floods but also try to help stop poaching in and around the park during the floods,” he said.
“The IFAW-WTI team has also formulated a plan for wildlife safety following the awareness meetings held in the fringe villages of Kaziranga and those in the foothills of Karbi Anglong. Conservationists, panchayats, village headmen, local NGOs, civil and forest authorities attended these meetings and sensitised villagers on how to save wildlife,” he said. “We have also trained a group of boys and girls on wildlife rescue as part of the pre-flood awareness campaign,” he said, adding that during the training the youth wanted to know about the rescue of wildlife, especially about snakes.
“A lot of snake-related cases are reported from the region during floods and they wanted to know how to identify whether the snake is venomous or not. Keeping that in mind, we organised an orientation programme with 11 young people,” he added.