Once a militant hotbed, Assam's Manas National park sees increase in tiger numbers

The latest camera trapping exercise has recorded 60 tigers, when it had fallen to nearly nil 20 years ago

Two decades ago, the gun-toting militants almost silenced tigers in Assam's Manas National Park sharing the border with Bhutan.

With all insurgent groups in the Bodoland region now giving up arms and conservation efforts stepped up in the past few years, roars of the Royal Bengal tigers are getting louder in the park.

The latest camera trapping exercise conducted in the 526-sq. km. Manas Tiger Reserve has recorded 60 tigers including 52 adults and eight cubs. The number is 12 (eight adults and four cubs) more than last year. Manas had reported 48 tigers in 2021, but the tiger population was almost nil 20 years ago, mainly due to insurgency problems.

"A total of 381 camera trap stations were deployed with camera trap support from our conservation partners such as WWF India, Wildlife Trust of India and Aaranyak. The exercise showed sex ratio of 1: 2.4, which is positively skewed towards the females from the ecological point of view," field director of Manas Tiger Reserve, Vaibhab Mathur said.

The latest camera trap exercise was carried out as per the guidelines of the National Tiger Conservation Authority. The report of the exercise was released by Pramod Boro, chief of Bodoland Territorial Council on the occasion of Global Tiger Day observed on Friday.

The national park also released the findings of the population estimation of major wildlife species found in the park. The estimation found 3,220 hog deer, 1,656 wild buffalos, 1,174 Indian bison, 804 sambar deer, and 2,613 elephants. "The exercise was carried out in a holistic manner for the first time by the frontline staff of Manas through distant sampling. Data was collected on line transects on elephant back using an Android-based digital platform by the forest guards and the foresters deployed in various anti-poaching camps," Mathur said.

Wildlife species like tigers in over 900sq. km Manas National Park once faced the threat of being extinct with insurgent groups using the jungles as their hideouts or as a transit to their camps in neighbouring Bhutan. Continuous felling of trees and destruction of forests also added to the loss of biodiversity and even conservation projects could not be implemented by the government agencies as well as the NGOs due to fear of militants.

A recent survey also found 48 one-horned rhinos in Manas, which were introduced through translocation, mainly from Kaziranga National Park and Pobitora Wildlife Sanctuary.

"There is potential for further increase in the number of tigers given the current prey availability. We should focus on conservation efforts and at the same time do more marketing and outreach activities for promotion of ecotourism in Manas," Pramod Boro said.