Annexure-I

ANNEXURE REFERRED TO IN REPLY TO PART (a) OF THE RAJYA SABHA UNSTARRED QUESTION NO. 727 ON TIGER RESERVES DUE FOR REPLY ON 02.08.2010.

LIST OF TIGER RESERVES IN INDIA

Sl. No.	Name of Tiger Reserve	State
1	Bandipur	Karnataka
2	Corbett	Uttarakhand
3	Kanha	Madhya Pradesh
4	Manas	Assam
5	Melghat	Maharashtra
6	Palamau	Jharkhand
7	Ranthambore	Rajasthan
8	Similipal	Orissa
9	Sunderbans	West Bengal
10	Periyar	Kerala
11	Sariska	Rajasthan
12	Buxa	West Bengal
13	Indravati	Chhattisgarh
14	Nagarjunsagar	Andhra Pradesh
15	Namdapha	Arunachal Pradesh
16	Dudhwa	Uttar Pradesh
17	Kalakad-Mundanthurai	Tamil Nadu
18	Valmiki	Bihar
19	Pench	Madhya Pradesh
20	Tadoba-Andheri	Maharashtra
21	Bandhavgarh	Madhya Pradesh
22	Panna	Madhya Pradesh
23	Dampa	Mizoram
24	Bhadra	Karnataka
25	Pench	Maharashtra
26	Pakke	Arunachal Pradesh
27	Nameri	Assam
28	Satpura	Madhya Pradesh
29	Anamalai	Tamil Nadu
30	Udanti-Sitanadi	Chattisgarh
31	Satkosia	Orissa
32	Kaziranga	Assam
33	Achanakmar	Chattisgarh
34	Dandeli-Anshi	Karnataka
35	Sanjay-Dubri	Madhya Pradesh
36	Mudumalai	Tamil Nadu
37	Nagarahole	Karnataka
38	Parambikulam	Kerala
39	Sahyadri	Maharashtra

Annexure-II

ANNEXURE REFERRED TO IN REPLY TO PART (b) OF THE RAJYA SABHA UNSTARRED QUESTION NO. 727 ON TIGER RESERVES DUE FOR REPLY ON 02.08.2010.

Forest occupancy and population estimates of tiger as per the refined methodology (2008)

State	Tiger km^2	Tiger Numbers
		No.	Lower limit	Upper limit
Shivalik-Gangetic Plain Landscape Complex
Uttarakhand	1901	178	161	195
Uttar Pradesh	2766	109	91	127
Bihar	510	10	7	13
Shivalik-Gangetic	5177	297	259	335
Central Indian Landscape Complex and Eastern Ghats Landscape Complex
Andhra Pradesh	14126	95	84	107
Chattisgarh	3609	26	23	28
Madhya Pradesh	15614	300	236	364
Maharashtra	4273	103	76	131
Orissa	9144	45	37	53
Rajasthan	356	32	30	35
Jharkhand**	1488	Not Assessed
Central Indian	48610	601	486	718
Western Ghats Landscape Complex
Karnataka	18715	290	241	339
Kerala	6168	46	39	53
Tamil Nadu	9211	76	56	95
Western Ghats	34094	412	336	487
North East Hills and Brahmaputra Flood Plains
Assam*	1164	70	60	80
Arunachal Pradesh*	1685	14	12	18
Mizoram*	785	6	4	8
Northern West Bengal*	596	10	8	12
North East Hills, and Brahmaputra	4230	100	84	118
Sunderbans	1586	Not Assessed
Total Tiger Population		1411	1165	1657

* Population estimates are based on possible density of tiger occupied landscape in the area, not assessed by double sampling.

** Data was not amenable to population estimation of tiger. However, available information about the landscape indicates low densities of tiger in the area ranging from 0.5 to 1.5 per 100 km².

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Annexure-III

ANNEXURE REFERRED TO IN REPLY TO PARTS (c) & (d) OF THE RAJYA SABHA UNSTARRED QUESTION NO. 727 ON TIGER RESERVES DUE FOR REPLY ON 02.08.2010.

Milestone initiatives (including the recent) taken by the Government of India for conservation of tiger and other wild animals

Legal steps

1. Amendment of the Wild Life (Protection) Act, 1972 for providing enabling provisions for constitution of the National Tiger Conservation Authority and the Tiger and Other Endangered Species Crime Control Bureau.

2. Enhancement of punishment in cases of offence relating to a tiger reserve or its core area.

Administrative steps

3. Strengthening of antipoaching activities, including special strategy for monsoon patrolling, by providing funding support to Tiger Reserve States, as proposed by them, for deployment of antipoaching squads involving ex-army personnel / home guards, apart from workforce comprising of local people, in addition to strengthening of communication / wireless facilities.

4. Constitution of the National Tiger Conservation Authority with effect from 4.09.2006, for strengthening tiger conservation by, interalia, ensuring normative standards in tiger reserve management, preparation of reserve specific tiger conservation plan, laying down annual audit report before Parliament, constituting State level Steering Committees under the Chairmanship of Chief Ministers and establishment of Tiger Conservation Foundation.

5. Constitution of a multidisciplinary Tiger and Other Endangered Species Crime Control Bureau (Wildlife Crime Control Bureau) with effect from 6.6.2007 to effectively control illegal trade in wildlife.

6. Declaration of nine new Tiger Reserves and in-principle approval accorded for creation of three new Reserves, namely Pilibhit in Uttar Pradesh, Ratapani in M.P. and Sunabeda in Orissa.

7. The revised Project Tiger guidelines have been issued to States for strengthening tiger conservation, which apart from ongoing activities, interalia, include funding support to States for enhanced village relocation/rehabilitation package for people living in core or critical tiger habitats (from Rs. 1 lakh/family to Rs. 10 lakhs/family), rehabilitation/resettlement of communities involved in traditional hunting, mainstreaming livelihood and wildlife concerns in forests outside tiger reserves and fostering corridor conservation through restorative strategy to arrest habitat fragmentation.

8. A scientific methodology for estimating tiger (including co-predators, prey animals and assessment of habitat status) has been evolved and mainstreamed. The findings of this estimation/assessment are bench marks for future tiger conservation strategy.

9. An area of 31207.11 sq. km. has been notified by 16 Tiger States (out of 17) as core or critical tiger habitat under section 38V of the Wildlife (Protection) Act, 1972, as amended in 2006 (Andhra Pradesh, Arunachal Pradesh, Assam, Chhattisgarh, Jharkhand, Karnataka, Kerala, Madhya Pradesh, Maharashtra, Mizoram, Orissa, Rajasthan, Tamil Nadu, Uttarakhand, Uttar Pradesh and West Bengal). The State of Bihar has taken a decision for notifying the core or critical tiger habitat (840 sq.km.). The State of Madhya Pradesh has not identified / notified the core / critical tiger habitat in its newly constituted tiger reserve (Sanjay National Park and Sanjay Dubri Wildlife Sanctuary).

Financial steps

10. Financial and technical help is provided to the States under various Centrally Sponsored Schemes, viz. Project Tiger and Integrated Development of Wildlife Habitats for enhancing the capacity and infrastructure of the States for providing effective protection to wild animals.

International Cooperation

11. India has a Memorandum of Understanding with Nepal on controlling trans-boundary illegal trade in wildlife and conservation, apart from a protocol on tiger conservation with China.

12. A Global Tiger Forum of Tiger Range Countries has been created for addressing international issues related to tiger conservation.

13. During the 14^th meeting of the Conference of Parties to CITES, which was held from 3^rd to 15^th June, 2007 at The Hague, India introduced a resolution along with China, Nepal and the Russian Federation, with directions to Parties with operations breeding tigers on a commercial scale, for restricting such captive populations to a level supportive only to conserving wild tigers. The resolution was adopted as a decision with minor amendments. Further, India made an intervention appealing to China to phase out tiger farming, and eliminate stockpiles of Asian big cats body parts and derivatives. The importance of continuing the ban on trade of body parts of tigers was emphasized.

14. Based on India’s strong intervention during the 58^th meeting of the Standing Committee of the CITES at Geneva from 6^th to 10^th July, 2009, the CITES Secretariat issued notification to Parties for submitting reports relating to compliance of Decisions 14.69 and 14.65 within 90 days with effect from 20.10.2009 (Progress made on restricting captive breeding operations of tigers etc.). During the 15^th meeting of the Conference of Parties, India intervened for retaining the Decision 14.69 dealing with operations breeding tigers on a commercial scale.

Reintroduction of Tigers

15. As a part of active management to rebuild Sariska and Panna Tiger Reserves where tigers have become locally extinct, reintroduction of tigers / tigresses have been done.

16. Special advisories issued for in-situ build up of prey base and tiger population through active management in tiger reserves having low population status of tiger and its prey.

Creation of Special Tiger Protection Force (STPF)

17. The policy initiatives announced by the Finance Minister in his Budget Speech of 29.2.2008, interalia, contains action points relating to tiger protection. Based on the one time grant of Rs. 50.00 crore provided to the National Tiger Conservation Authority (NTCA) for raising, arming and deploying a Special Tiger Protection Force, the proposal for the said force has been approved by the competent authority for 13 tiger reserves. Rs. 93 lakhs each has been released to Corbett, Ranthambhore & Dudhwa Tiger Reserve for creation of STPF during 2008-09. Since then, the guidelines of the STPF have been revised for deploying forest personnel in place of Police as an option-II, with scope for involving local people like the Van Gujjars.

18. In collaboration with TRAFFIC-INDIA, an online tiger crime data base has been launched, and Generic Guidelines for preparation of reserve specific Security Plan has been evolved.

Recent initiatives

19. Implementing a tripartite MOU with tiger States, linked to fund flows for effective implementation of tiger conservation initiatives.

20. Rapid assessment of tiger reserves done.

21. Special crack teams sent to tiger reserves affected by left wing extremism and low population status of tiger and its prey.

22. Chief Ministers of tiger States addressed at the level of the Minister of State (Independent Charge) for Environment and Forests on urgent issues, viz. implementation of the tripartite MOU, creation of the Tiger Conservation Foundation, stepping up protection etc.

23. Chief Ministers of States having tiger reserves affected by left wing extremism and low population status of tiger and its prey addressed for taking special initiatives.

24. Steps taken for modernizing the infrastructure and field protection, besides launching ‘M-STrIPES’ for effective field patrolling and monitoring.

25. Steps taken for involvement of Non-Governmental Experts in the ongoing all India tiger estimation.

26. Special independent team sent to Similipal for assessing the status, besides constituting State level Coordination Committee for redressing the administrative problems.

27. Issue of tiger farming and trafficking of tiger body parts discussed at the level of Minister of State (Independent Charge) for Environment and Forests with the Chinese Authorities.

28. Action taken for amending the Wildlife (Protection) Act to ensure effective conservation.

29. Initiatives taken for improving the field delivery through capacity building of field officials, apart from providing incentives.

30. Steps taken for the independent Monitoring and Evaluation of tiger reserves.

31. Action initiated for using Information Technology to strengthen surveillance in tiger reserves.

32. Providing special assistance for mitigation of human-tiger conflicts in problematic areas.

33. As an outcome of the fourth Trans-border Consultative Group Meeting held in New Delhi, a joint resolution has been signed with Nepal for biodiversity / tiger conservation.

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