Central Probe team recommends a second homeland for Gir lions

New Delhi, Apr 15 (UNI) The Central team which probed into the recent deaths of the Asiatic lions in Gujarat's Gir forest reserves has recommended a second home land for the highly endangered species, an idea consistently rejected by the state Government.

The probe team has found poaching to be the main cause of the eight deaths that occurred between March and April either outside or at the periphery of the park.

However, non-official sources have put the death toll at a dozen.

Sources in the Environment MMinistry told UNI said that as per the committee's findings, the lions became vulnerable to proaching as they spread to areas outside the protected park, because of the increase in their population which made the home overcorwded for them.

There are four protetced spaces in Gir with the Gir itself as the core area. Earlier, the lions were seen only in 1800 sq km area, but now they are visible in an area of 18,000 sq km, which means that they have dispersed to places outside the protected areas thus falling prey to poachers.

It has become very necessary that a second homeleand should be developed for the lions, the inquiry committee said in its report.

However, the recommendations of the committee might not be that easy for the Centre to follow because of the sensitivity of the matter. The Gujarat government was reluctant to part with the lions, as they gave a distictive place to the state from tourism point of view, a fact which has also generated public sentimenmts against the shifting.

While recommending a second home for the lions, the committee did not name any site but said that the selection should be based on objective criteria.

The Gujarat Government has so far rejected all proposals to shift some of the lions to a second home in Kuno Palampur Wildlife Sanctuary in Madhya Pradesh.

The probe team has also recommended stregthening of the administrative machinery, training of the staff and recruiting more young staff for the protection of the forest.

They have also suggested for having a landcsape management strategy. For example villages in the vicinity of the Gir could be involved in the prtotection and conservation efforts.

The Committee's suggestion for a second homeland for the Asiatic lions may renew pressure on the Guajarat Government to agree to part with a pair of lions, so that it cam be housed in some other park and breed a second population.

Experts feel that Gir, which has the last wild population of Asiatic lions, can prove to be their mass grave if any epidemic or natural or man-made disaster hits the National Park.

They say it was necessary to develop a second population of the lions to avoid inbreeding and achieve genetic diversity to make the species more resistant to diseases and epidemics.

Experts point out that wild population of more than 300 Asiatic Lions was derived from over a dozen individuals and thus was highly inbred. According to various studies, continued inbreeding in captivity makes the lions susceptible to many diseases and to infertility.

The probe team's recomendations are only keping the the experts views that despite heavy protection, incidents of poaching have been happening, as the Gir forest is surounded by human habitation. Moreover, the 350 odd lions find the space crunch due to encroaching human habitation, and they migrate to unprotected framlands coming in conflict with man.

UNI