India home to over 70% world tiger population, 2,967 tigers across 53 reserves, Centre to SC [Read Status Report]

NEW DELHI: The Supreme Court was on Friday told India has achieved the target of doubling of tiger population in 2018, four years ahead of schedule of the St Petersburg Declaration on tiger Conservation, after having recorded their numbers as 2,967 across 53 tiger reserves as per 2018 census.

"Due to efforts of the Government of India thorough the National Tiger Conservation Authority, the tiger has been brought from the brink of extinction to an assured path of recovery, which is evident in findings of the quadrennial All India Tiger Estimation conducted in 2006, 2010, 2014 and 2018," a written response filed in the top court said.

These results have shown a healthy annual growth rate of tigers at 6%, which offsets natural losses and keeps tigers at the habitats carrying capacity level, in the Indian context.

The Project Tiger became a role model for scientific management of protected areas in India. It laid down the concept of core-buffer-corridor zonation, prescribed interventions for protection, habitat improvement, field data collection relating to change in the composition of flora and fauna on account of protection, animal estimation and other aspects, it added.

In a status report, National Tiger Conservation Authority said, India has become home to more than 70% tiger population in the world. A comprehensive report of All India Tiger Estimation (2018) was released on July 29, 2020. The fourth round of country level tiger status assessment completed in 2018, with findings indicating an increase with a tiger population estimate of 2967 (lower and upper limits being 2603 and 3346 respectively), as compared to the last country level estimation of 2014, with an estimate of 2226, 2010 estimation with an estimation of 1706 and 2006 estimation, with an estimate of 1411.

The report said the fifth cycle of All India Tiger Estimation is currently ongoing and it will be completed in 2023.

Status of leopards in India was released wherein population estimate of 12,582, was reported in assessed areas of tiger landscape. This increase is more than 60% in comparison to the last such assessment done in 2014, it further pointed out.

The status report was filed in response to a plea by advocate Anupam Tripathi in 2017 seeking to save endangered tigers whose numbers are dwindling in the country.

It further pointed out a new tiger reserve "Ranipur Tiger Reserve" has been declared in Uttar Pradesh. Now the number of tiger reserves in the country has gone up to 53 (Covering an 75,796.83 sq. km) as compared to 50 tiger reserves in year 2018. Further, approval on NTCA has been accorded to MM Hills Wildlife Sanctuary, Dibang Wildlife Sanctuary and Guru Ghasidas National Park & Tamor Pingla Wildlife Sanctuary for declaration as tiger reserve, it added.

Additional Solicitor General Aishwarya Bhati, representing the Centre, submitted before a bench of Justices K M Joseph and B V Nagarathna that a lot of work has been done for the conservation of tigers and increasing their population.

The top court, after recording Bhats submissions, put the matter for further hearing in March, as Tripathi could not attend the hearing.

The bench recorded that as per the 2018 census, India has 2,967 tigers spread out in 53 tiger reserves and this number constitutes 70 % of the global number and figures point to the growth of the tigers.

[Read Status Report]