MoEFCC | Creating 32 Tiger Corridors in the country

PIB News Update: Minister of State, Ministry of Environment, Forest & Climate Change, Shri Babul Supriyo has informed that The National Tiger Conservation Authority in collaboration with the Wildlife Institute of India has published a document titled “Connecting Tiger Populations for Long-term Conservation”, which has mapped out 32 major corridors across the country, management interventions for which are operationalised through a Tiger Conservation Plan, mandated under section 38V of the Wildlife (Protection) Act, 1972.  The list of macro/landscape level tiger corridors are as under:

Sl. No.	Landscape	Corridor	States/ Country
1.	Shivalik Hills & Gangetic Plains	Rajaji-Corbett	Uttarakhand
		(ii) Corbett-Dudhwa	Uttarakhand, Uttar Pradesh, Nepal
		(iii) Dudhwa-Kishanpur-Katerniaghat	Uttar Pradesh, Nepal
2.	Central India & Eastern Ghats	(i) Ranthambhore-Kuno-Madhav	Madhya Pradesh, Rajasthan
		(ii) Bandhavgarh-Achanakmar	Madhya Pradesh, Chhattisgarh
		(iii) Bandhavgarh-Sanjay Dubri-Guru Ghasidas	Madhya Pradesh
		(iv) Guru Ghasidas-Palamau-Lawalong	Chhattisgarh & Jharkhand
		(v) Kanha-Achanakmar	Madhya Pradesh, Chhattisgarh
		(vi) Kanha-Pench	Madhya Pradesh, Maharashtra
		(vii) Pench-Satpura-Melghat	Madhya Pradesh, Maharashtra
		(viii) Kanha-Navegaon Nagzira-Tadoba-Indravati	Madhya Pradesh, Maharashtra, Chhattisgarh, Andhra Pradesh
		(ix) Indravati-Udanti Sitanadi-Sunabeda	Chhattisgarh, Odisha
		(x) Similipal-Satkosia	Odisha
		(xi) Nagarjunasagar-Sri Venkateshwara National Park	Andhra Pradesh
3.	Western Ghats	(i) Sahyadri-Radhanagari-Goa	Maharashtra, Goa
		(ii) Dandeli Anshi-Shravathi Valley	Karnataka
		(iii) Kudremukh-Bhadra	Karnataka
		(iv) Nagarahole-Pusphagiri-Talakavery	Karnataka
		(v) Nagarahole-Bandipur-Mudumalai-Wayanad	Karnataka, Kerala, Tamil Nadu
		(vi) Nagarahole-Mudumalai-Wayanad	Karnataka, Kerala, Tamil Nadu
		(vii) Parambikulam-Eranikulam-Indira Gandhi	Kerala, Tamil Nadu
		(viii) Kalakad Mundanthurai-Periyar	Kerala, Tamil Nadu
4.	North East	(i) Kaziranga-Itanagar WLS	Assam, Arunachal Pradesh
		(ii) Kaziranga-Karbi Anglong	Assam
		(iii) Kaziranga-Nameri	Assam
		(iv) Kaziranga-Orang	Assam
		(v) Kaziranga-Papum Pane	Assam
		(vi) Manas-Buxa	Assam, West Bengal, Bhutan
		(vii) Pakke-Nameri-Sonai Rupai-Manas	Arunachal Pradesh, Assam
		(viii) Dibru Saikhowa-D’Ering-Mehaong	Assam, Arunachal Pradesh
		(ix) Kamlang-Kane-Tale Valley	Arunachal Pradesh
		(x) Buxa-Jaldapara	West Bengal

Further, a 3 pronged strategy to manage human-tiger negative interactions has been advocated as follows:-

1. Material and logistical support: Funding support through the ongoing Centrally Sponsored Scheme of Project Tiger, is provided to tiger reserves for acquiring capacity in terms of infrastructure and material, to deal with tigers dispersing out of source areas.  These are solicited by tiger reserves through an Annual Plan of Operation (APO) every year which stems out from an overarching Tiger Conservation Plan (TCP), mandated under Section 38 V of the Wildlife (Protection) Act, 1972.  Inter alia, activities such as payment of ex-gratia and compensation, periodic awareness campaigns to sensitize, guide and advise the general populace on man-animal conflict, dissemination of information through various forms of media, procurement of immobilization equipment, drugs, training and capacity building of forest staff to deal with conflict events are generally solicited.

 

2. Restricting habitat interventions: Based on the carrying capacity of tigers in a tiger reserve, habitat interventions are restricted through an overarching TCP.  In case tiger numbers are at carrying capacity levels, it is advised that habitat interventions should be limited so that there is no excessive spill over of wildlife including tigers thereby minimizing man-animal conflict.  Further, in buffer areas around tiger reserves, habitat interventions are restricted such that they are sub-optimal vis-à-vis the core/critical tiger habitat areas, judicious enough to facilitate dispersal to other rich habitat areas only.

 

3. Standard Operating Procedure (SOPs): The National Tiger Conservation Authority has issued following three SOPs to deal with man-animal conflict which are available in public domain:

1. To deal with emergency arising due to straying of tigers in human dominated landscapes
2. To deal with tiger depredation on livestock
3. For active management towards rehabilitation of tigers from source areas at the landscape level.

 

The three SOPs inter alia include the issue of managing dispersing tigers, managing livestock kills so as to reduce conflict as well as relocating tigers from source areas to areas where density of tiger is low, so that conflict in rich source areas does not occur.

 

In technical collaboration with the Wildlife Institute of India,  the National Tiger Conservation Authority has also published a document titled ‘Eco-Friendly measures to mitigate impacts of Linear infrastructure on wildlife’ to safeguard these corridors from linear infrastructure development besides sensitizing user agencies which inter alia include Indian Railway Traffic Service Probationers, National Highways Authority of India personnel, Indian Railway Engineers, besides others.

An amount of Rs. 370 crores, Rs. 345 crores and Rs. 350 crores was allocated during the financial years 2016-17, 2017-18 and 2018-19 respectively, while an amount of Rs. 350 crores has been allocated for the current financial year under the Centrally Sponsored Scheme of Project Tiger.  Details of funds released under the ongoing Centrally Sponsored Scheme of Project Tiger, during the last three years and the current year, State-wise, are at Annexure-I.

ANNEXURE-I

 

Funds released under the ongoing Centrally Sponsored Scheme of Project Tiger, during the last three years and the current year, State-wise

S. No.	State	2016-17	2017-18	2018-19	2019-20 (as on 21.11.2019)
1.	Andhra Pradesh	173.49	232.49	217.992	114.480
2.	Arunachal Pradesh	597.29	671.0222	929.762	737.080
3.	Assam	1510.93	2309.608	1919.624	2198.760
4.	Bihar	487.84	552.273	570.897	562.840
5.	Chhattisgarh	626.57	1315.076	536.135	358.530
6.	Jharkhand	323.76	338.62	367	172.070
7.	Karnataka	3203.62	2308.846	2267.428	1985.950
8.	Kerala	780.23	636.412	653.03	593.160
9.	Madhya Pradesh	12885.6	11455.457	5343.89	2985.910
10.	Maharashtra	8229.72	6524.165	11049.59	3709.550
11.	Mizoram	301.55	215.316	318.842	0.000
12.	Odisha	917.17	1646.127	1022.322	1303.320
13.	Rajasthan	381.3	773.09	791.83	1164.030
14.	Tamil Nadu	949.87	2551.058	2366.823	1387.700
15.	Telangana	239.26	350.416	1115.65	333.701
16.	Uttarakhand	1023.41	1187.439	685.336	1242.490
17.	Uttar Pradesh	1057.05	820.074	1417.26	1793.960
18.	West  Bengal	536.14	597.5808	719.01	480.280
19.	AIL India Tiger Estimation (AITE) All Tiger Reserve States including Nagaland, Manipur and Goa.	0.00	14.93	24.8625	0.00
Total		34224.80	34500.00	32317.284	21123.811

(Rs. in Lakhs)