Crop guards pose grave threat to wild animals

Mazhar Ali, TNN | Nov 11, 2011, 08.18AM IST Chandrapur: Illegal firearms carried by crop guards are posing grave threat to the wildlife in the fringe forest areas. There have been many instances when the crop guards, deployed by the villagers to protect their farms against intruding wildlife, have been found involved in poaching. But, the issue has remained unaddressed since years by both tiger protection cell and forest department. In fresh incident of wildlife poaching, Gurucharansingh Juni deployed as crop guard by villagers of Ekona in Warora tehsil poached a bluebull on Wednesday morning. His two accomplices Shersingh Juni and Mahadeosingh Juni from Jambhulghat village, were arrested by forest officers of Warora with 7kg of bluebull meat near Shegaon while trying to sale it in the evening. Warora RFO Arun Tikhe said that arrested accused have admitted to poaching the bluebull with the help of trained dogs, but possibilities of absconding Gururcharnsingh Juni carrying illegal muzzle loading gun cannot be ruled out. On August 31, a farm guard Jindersingh Kalani had accidentally shot three persons, critically injuring them, with his country made gun (bharmar), while trying to bring down wild boars intruding into a farm adjacent to Minzari village in Chimur tehsil. Later during police interrogation Kalani has confessed of poaching over a dozen wild animals with the help of his illegal firearms. Couple of weeks back, crop guard Surindersingh was caught for poaching wild boar near Nand village in Nagpur forest division. He too is suspected to have poached the boar with the help of illegal muzzle loading gun. In the instances of poaching cases busted by forest officers, accused farm guards belonged to Sikalkar community. Experts feel there are over 3,000 such illegal firearms in the fringe forest areas of Chandrapur district. But, this grave issue has remained unaddressed by the authorities. "Tiger cell has never discussed the issue. It never tried to gather the record of crops guards being recruited by the villages their area. Crop protection guns had often been used for poaching too," said Nitin Desai, Central India director of NGO Wildlife Protection Society of India (WPSI). RFO Tikhe, who busted the poaching, claimed that there is a state government resolution (GR), which allows the farmers to shoot down the intruding wild boar or bluebell into their farm. "But, they need to seek prior permission from concerned RFO for killing the intruding animal. But they need legal firearm to accomplice the task. In case of crop guards, mostly they have illegal firearms, hence nobody comes forward to get permission." he said. BOX Common practice Deployment of crop guard is common practice in villages. Usually villagers prefer the persons who have illegal muzzle loading guns. The crop guards are expected to fire in air, thus making loud noise, to scare away the intruding wild boars and bluebulls that tend to destroy the standing crops. However, the farm guards moving freely around the fringe forest areas, often bring down the wild animals with the help of his gun. http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/city/nagpur/Crop-guards-pose-grave-threat-to-wild-animals/articleshow/10687449.cms