22 May 2020



South Asian River Dolphin, also known as Ganges River Dolphin (Platanista Gangetica) is an endangered species found in Ganges-Brahmaputra-Meghna river systems in India and Bangladesh. It is listed as Endangered by IUCN and protected as Schedule I species under the Wildlife (Protection) Act, 1972. It is also the National Aquatic Animal of India and the focus of a number of conservation projects.

Around mid-2019, Human and Environment Alliance League (HEAL), a conservation focused NGO in Kolkata, started receiving news of these dolphins being killed in central West Bengal – particularly in the districts of Murshidabad and Malda. The main motivation seemed to be the extraction of oil, which is prized as very effective fish bait among the large fishing communities settled along Ganges and Hooghly rivers in this district. 

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