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Cat-ching

Dikom Tea estate leads by example in rehabilitating captured leopards

The problem of leopards prowling into the numerous tea estates across Assam had been a perennial problem for the garden managements for quite some time now. In other words, man-leopard clashes had almost become an everyday phenomenon in many tea gardens of the state as workers often complain of being at the receiving end. On the other hand, there have been many instances of workers mercilessly killing leopards.

 

Environmentalists allege that many a times the man-leopard clashes occur due to the apathetic attitude of the garden management and insensitivity towards the issue. However, the same can not be said for the management of the Dikom tea estate in Upper Assam’s Dibrugarh district where a full grown male leopard was recently captured in the early hours with assistance from the forest department. The garden is owned by Rossell Industries Limited – a leading tea producer of the country.

The garden management in Dikom led by its manager Samar Jyoti Chaliha had always been sensitive towards the issue and in fact had never considered the man-leopard clash a problem.

“We in Dikom had never taught our workers to be hostile towards the leopards due to which we had been able to capture 12 leopards during the last four years. In fact, we organize internal awareness drives in our garden quite regularly which had given us good results as our workers too have become totally sensitive about the leopards,” senior factory assistant manager Bhaskar Phukon, himself a wildlife enthusiast said.

The garden management had formed a special unit under Phukon to tackle the issue which had become an additional duty for the management these days. “Initially, it was a very hard job to convince the workers as by instinct they had always been aggressive towards wild animals. However, after several rounds of both formal and informal orientation, the workers had become conscious about the leopards, which had helped us immensely,” Phukon said.

Dikom tea estate which has three divisions namely Dikom, Sessa and Wilton had witnessed a rapid growth in leopard population, one of the reasons being that the jungles are being cleared regularly by the Indian Air Force (IAF) base at adjacent Nudwa. “As the bushes are being cleared by the IAF, the leopards make the tea gardens their home, by nature too it has been observed that leopards prefer habitation which is close to human beings which ensures the leopards a steady stock of their prey,” Phukon added.

Most of us think of leopards to be ferocious and dangerous creatures. But this is not the truth. Leopards (Panthera Pardus) are a Schedule I species and protected under the Indian Wildlife (Protection) Act, 1972. By nature leopards are very shy and do not require a huge area to live in. Tea gardens and small jungles are ideal habitat for the leopards. Moreover, the tea gardens have good population of small animals in them which ensures food security for the leopards. In fact, it is here that the man-leopard conflict begins as leopards start preying upon the domestic animals of the tea workers.

Many a times, some leopards also attack human beings and injure them. There are also some instances of human beings being killed due to leopard attacks. In order to get respite from this man-leopard conflict the gardens have approached the forest department for a solution. However, as the forest department is handicapped by way of resources, the gardens need to devise their own self protection methodology which ensures safety of both the leopards and also the people.

Dikom tea estate is one of the very few gardens which had devised its own methodology to deal with the problem of man-leopard conflict. The garden has a well trained man – Joydhan Pator – who is considered to be an expert in the entire process of capture of leopards. “Right from selection of location to setting up of the cage, setting up of the bait etc, Joydhan does it with perfection, all the 12 leopards which we had captured with assistance from the forest department was carried out under the supervision of Joydhan,” garden manager Samar Jyoti Chaliha said.

Joydhan in his late 50s now is very compassionate towards the leopards and he had made it mandatory to offer obeisance to the Almighty each time a cage is set up to trap the leopards. “Praying is very important; trapping of the leopards is no fun and merry making for me and it should not be also. After all these creatures are also being created by God and they too have lives in them. Mankind will have to show respect towards animals,” Pator said.

Nakul Khound, the co-ordinator of IRAB-KIRAB, an environmental NGO says, “Capture of the animals from one area and releasing in a so-called reserve forest area is no solution, it might be a temporary solution for the people of a certain area, but if we are to think of a permanent solution we will have to devise a proper methodology of co-existence to ensure permanent protection for the leopards and at the same time the human population of the locality. Massive awareness drives and the ones adopted by the management of the Dikom tea estate too can help in building awareness on not harming these animals.”

Dibrugarh Divisional Forest Officer (DFO) Anurag Singh complimented the efforts of the Dikom tea estate management and expressed hope that the other tea estates where the man-leopard conflict exists will follow the Dikom example.

“Dikom tea estate had set an excellent example in terms of conservation of wildlife. These kinds of efforts – the interest shown by the management in conservation related issues – will definitely help us in the government led conservation efforts,” Singh said.

Ripunjoy Das