Tiger tourism: revised norms replace 10% tax with fixed amount

The monthly sums to be paid by the resorts will be decided based on which category they come under Neha Sethi The government has to submit the new norms to the Supreme Court, which is deciding a case on curbing tiger tourism in India, before the next hearing on 27 September. New Delhi: The government’s revised guidelines on eco-tourism propose allowing restricted tourism in the core areas of tiger reserves, according to two government officials privy to the new norms. The guidelines also recommend that resorts bordering India’s 41 tiger reserves pay fixed monthly sums to the government instead of the 10% eco tax proposed earlier. The government has to submit the new norms to the Supreme Court, which is deciding a case on curbing tiger tourism in India, before the next hearing on 27 September. The monthly sums to be paid by the resorts will be decided based on which category a resort comes under. The category will be determined on the basis of the area resorts occupy and the revenue they earn. “All the resorts will be divided into different slabs based on the basis of their revenue and their area among others and then they will pay a fixed amount from their revenue monthly,” one of the government officials said. The slabs will be finalized in a couple of days before the guidelines are submitted to the court, he said. The second official confirmed this. Both officials declined to be identified. The Supreme Court on 29 August gave the government about a month to re-draft guidelines for tourism in tiger reserves. Attorney General G.E. Vahanvati had sought more time to do this keeping in mind both tiger protection and sustainable tourism. The first government official cited above, however, said the guidelines were being re-drafted under pressure from lobbyists for the tiger tourism industry, which is worth at least Rs.1,000 crore annually, according to some experts. This lobby was unhappy with the Supreme Court’s interim decision on 24 July to ban any form of tourism in the core areas of the 41 tiger reserves to aid conservation efforts. The core area is a critical habitat for tigers and is identified on the basis of availability of water, prey and shelter. After the court’s 29 August direction, the government constituted a committee to revise the eco-tourism guidelines. The committee recommended that a fixed amount be collected monthly from resorts near tiger reserves, which will be used for the welfare of the local communities and aid conservation efforts. The previous guidelines recommending a 10% eco tax were on the same lines and suggested that the funds “collected should be earmarked to fund human-wildlife conflict management, conservation and local livelihood development.” The first government official said the new guidelines do not call for a ban on tourism in the core areas of tiger reserves. “Restricted tourism will be allowed in core areas. States will have the power to limit the...tourists going into core areas. However, they will not be allowed to exceed the current limit on tourists in every tiger reserve,” the official said. State-level and local area committees will be constituted to advise state governments on tourism limits in core areas, the official said. The mandate of these two committees was mentioned in the previous guidelines too. “The tourism activity in a reserve will depend on the potential of the tiger reserve,” the official added. There is also a plan to include local bodies such as gram sabhas and panchayats in conservation, and to “give them a bigger role in planning and decision making”, he said. States will design their own an eco-tourism plans for tiger reserves based on the Union government’s broad guidelines. “It will be on a case-to-case basis,” the official said. The revised guidelines, he said, are “specific for tiger reserves.” The previous norms were called “guidelines for eco-tourism in and around protected areas” and were not specific to tiger reserves. Activist Ajay Dubey had filed a special leave petition to stop “inviolate activities” including tourism in the core areas of tiger reserves in the Supreme Court in July 2011. He approached the apex court after his demand to ban tourism in the core areas was rejected by the Madhya Pradesh high court in January 2011. Environmentalists Shekar Dattari, a wildlife filmmaker, and Swathi Seshadri of Equations, a non-governmental organization that works on tourism, declined to comment on the redrafted guidelines because they are part of the committee that framed them. Conservationist Prerna Bindra said she couldn’t comment on the guidelines before they are made public. http://origin-www.livemint.com/Politics/nSaLEAh6h7DJS7I983mvSM/Tiger-tourism-revised-norms-replace-10-tax-with-fixed-amou.html