Jumbo problem in land of gajapatis
22 June 2022 The
elephant may be India’s national heritage animal but it faces an
unprecedented existential crisis in Odisha. Poaching, an indifferent
administration and a compromised forest bureaucracy are driving the
pachyderm population to an untimely death. Their tusks cause their
doom. Ivory is precious, and its trade, though illegal, is rampant and
carried on with impunity. Four carcasses, including three this month
alone, were exhumed from the Athagarh Forest Division of Cuttack
district in 2022.
The complicity of the forest staff is apparent
in the manner in which the news of the deaths was suppressed.
Obviously, nobody has a clue about the disappearing tusks. In nearby
Boudh district, the cannabis mafia brought in hired guns to poach two
elephants and decamped with the ivory tusks last month.
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