New Delhi, April 14: Unregulated tourism near wildlife habitats in the country is posing a great threat to tigers and the environment ministry has taken up the matter with the state governments, Environment Minister Jairam Ramesh said Wednesday.
“Unregulated tourism is as much a threat to tiger population as poaching and poisoning. We are in talks with the state governments to put a check on mushrooming luxury resorts around tiger reserves in the country,” Ramesh told reporters here.
Ramesh said the greatest impact of tourism can be seen in Corbett National Park, where four big cats have died in the past two months.
“Prime Minister Manmohan Singh and I have personally written to the Uttarakhand chief minister not to allow any construction around Corbett and he said he is taking action but the pressure continues,” he said.
The environment minister said the deaths of tigers in Corbett were unnatural mainly caused by poaching and poisoning.
According to official data, 11 tigers were killed in the first two months of 2010 while 66 tigers were killed last year.
“The normal mortality of tiger in a year is 30 but 66 were killed in 2009. Of these, 46 were killed inside tiger reserves while 20 were killed in forests. People from mafias to local politicians and many others are involved in killings as they want the tiger population to dwindle so that the land can be used for mining or construction,” he added.
There are 39 Project Tiger reserves in the country and 663 protected areas.
According to National Tiger Conservation Authority (NTCA), there are 1,411 tigers left in the country.
The NTCA is in the process of conducting second tiger census in the country and the results will be available by November.
–Agencies