Shimla, May 8 (IANS) Himachal Pradesh will to set up a wildlife crime control unit, besides installing trap cameras in Great Himalayan National Park, the country’s richest biodiversity spot in the western Himalayas, to keep tabs on poachers, it was announed here Friday.
It will also initiate steps to check the dwindling population of the house sparrow.
A meeting of the state wildlife board, chaired by Chief Minister Virbhadra Singh, decided to set up the wildlife crime control unit with its headquarters in the state capital, an official statement said.
Kinnaur, Kullu, Dharamsala and Chamba districts have been identified as sensitive zones, which would be manned by a superintendent of police-level officer along with a divisional forest officer, range officers, deputy rangers and forest guards.
It was also decided to install 45 trap cameras in the Great Himalayan National Park, a UNESCO heritage site in Kullu district’s Tirthan Valley.
The chief minister suggested that the general public and the panchayat would be motivated to check poaching.
Expressing concern over declining population of the house sparrows, Virbhadra Singh asked the wildlife wing to formulate conservation strategies for its long-term survival.
He, however, expressed happiness over the success of the wildlife wing in breeding the highly-endangered western tragopan in captivity.
It was informed at the meeting that the western tragopan captive population was too small but efforts were on to build up a viable captive population and release them in natural habitats so as to increase their population in nature.
“I am happy to learn that Rs.5.15-crore Snow Leopard Conservation Project is being implemented in the state. Steps should be taken for radio collaring of snow leopards soon so that their exact population could be assessed,” the chief minister said.
He said the steps taken for conservation of vulture population has started bearing results and more than 800 vulture chicks have been born.
He asked the authorities concerned to carry out undercover surveys to ensure that diclofenac medicine, which is the main cause of death of vultures in nature, is not being sold anywhere.
On monkey menace and their sterilizations, it was informed that 96,126 monkeys have been sterilised till date since 2007 in seven monkey sterilization centres.
Principal Chief Conservator of Forests J.S. Walia said the department is planning to construct ‘Van Vatikas’, which would be a natural habitat for the monkeys where fruit bearing trees would be grown apart from constant supply of food to the primates.
He said the wildlife wing is also planning to set up a snake park at Gopalpur in Kangra district, an interpretation centre at Sarahan in Shimla district and is also going to equip the department with tranquilizer guns, improved cages and ultra-sound machines.
Forest Minister Thakur Singh Bharmouri said a pair of tigers is being brought to the Renuka Zoo from Karnataka besides a pair of lions for the Gopalpur zoo.