Human-wildlife conflict is often misconstrued to be damaging to people, but the wildlife also suffers in a human dominated landscape
The year was 2012, and I was called to New Delhi for consultations on some urgent wildlife related matter that was requisitioned as a compliance by the Ministry of Environment & Forests, Govt. of India. I rushed to the capital on the next available flight hoping for some adventurous assignment. Until this time, I had gathered experience working with some charismatic wild animals like crocodiles in my own state, the Gangetic River dolphins in Assam, and Asian elephants in Saranda Forest of Jharkhand. But I wasn’t sure what was coming up this time.
The challenge this time involved the Asiatic Lions increasingly invading urban and semiurban spaces far away from their sanctuary in Gir, and co-inhabiting with people and their livestock, posing a risk to their own safety and that of people as well. The Asiatic Lion is a high conservation value, IWPA Schedule-I carnivore with a relatively small population restricted to Sasan Gir in the state of Gujarat and is not found anywhere else in the world! There was a growing anxiety and possibility of heightened human-lion conflict in these areas, and I was asked to study this scenario and suggest conflict mitigation plan. The task excited me and filled me with intense anxiety, both at the same time.
I returned to Goa quite elated and started planning my first field visit to the coastline of Saurashtra peninsula of Gujarat, that was to be my field for next two years. This terrain is a mix of agricultural landscape with industrial areas; transacted by roads and rails, occupied by mining leases, factories, farmlands and human settlement. The lions had left the jungle and entered this ‘anthropogenic maze’ and needed to be safeguarded from conflict situations.
Human-wildlife conflict is often misconstrued to be damaging to people and projects animals negatively, but the wildlife also suffers in a human dominated landscape. The engineered landscapes confuse and scare the animals that often stray into dense human habitations and get chased or attacked fatally. The railway tracks are death traps too, with so many wild animals getting knocked or run over. The open wells of rural areas pose risk to animals in darkness, with leopards and lions often falling into waters from a height. Of course, the wild animals out of wilderness pose a threat to human life and property, including cattle and other livestock that are depredated. Their presence and movement in human settlement create a fear psychosis and can greatly encumber life and work.
Knowing that solutions would require expertise from many domains other than wildlife, I constituted my team including Architect Padma Kamat who gave valuable inputs on landscape interventions. I invited Prakash Salelkar, an in-service Goan Range Forest Officer then, Dr Sachin Tendulkar, an agriculture and water domain expert from Goa and Dr Utkarsha Chavan from Mumbai to join my team as adjunct experts and help me collect critical data on lions. Two young research scholars from Rajasthan joined me as field assistants on a regular basis.
During the very first trip, I requested the legendary Wildlife Biologist Dr AJT Johnsingh to accompany us to the field. However, due to his prior engagements he could not join, but instead deputed one of his research scholars who had spent years in Gir studying social behaviour of lions.
Initially there was a lot of suspicion about our presence and purpose. Getting permission from the Gujarat Forest department was tough. Gujarat government was very possessive about lions and uneasy with the idea of relocating any lions to Kuno National Park as their ‘second home’. While scientists like Dr Yadavendra Zhala and Dr Ravi Chellam were pressing for a ‘second home’ for lions as an insurance against unforeseen calamities that could wipe out lions altogether, there was clear reluctance on part of the state.
Goa’s then Additional PCCF, Richard D’Costa called up his counterpart in Gujarat (who happened to be his IFS batchmate) and put in a word for me making things easier.
Over the next two years, we observed matriarchal prides of lionesses and their cubs, understanding every aspect of their behaviour. We spent long hours following this big cat, collecting their scat for examination to ascertain their prey preferences. We stayed close when they devoured their prey, observing how they train their cubs at prey. We’ve seen with disbelief how lions drink from the water impoundments constructed for cattle. While it was shocking to see how these lions stray on roads and highways paralysing traffic at night, it was heartwarming to see the local Ahirs community at ease with the felid around their settlement, showcasing coexistence between man and wild animals.
Asiatic lion prides usually comprise of lionesses alone, and lions join only during the breeding season. In 2014, we encountered a courting and mating pair in the middle of a vast scrubland close to our hotel. This only confirmed that these lions were disturbance-adapted and at ease with urban environments. While we sensitised the local children and the women, we trained the workforce of many industries here on protocols and practice of effective co-existence.
We learnt that the carcasses of animals preyed upon by lions revived the local vulture population. That a simple solution like having a sanitary toilet in the compound can significantly reduce the risk of lion attacks on people. We proposed a benign carnivore- barricade planting local flora on raised earth-berms as aversive visual stimuli that could keep wildlife away from dense human habitation and avoid a conflict situation.
Of course, during those two years chasing lions we also visited nearby places like Sial Bet, Diu, Somnath, Gir and Kutch feasting on Khandvi, Handvo, Dhokla and Undhiyo and Fafda jalebi - Gujarat’s culinary richness.
