Kaziranga: In a unique and aggressive move by the Forest Rangers deployed at the famed Kaziranga National Park in Assam, the bid to reduce the menace of poaching has reached new heights.
The war against poaching has now been offensive than ever in the Kaziranga National Park as the Rangers have found it to be an incredibly successful way to protect their endangered Indian one-horned rhinoceros, by shooting the poachers on sight.
This new aggressive offensive by the forest department guards has proved to be incredibly successful in reducing the overall poaching incidents in the coveted national park.
Kaziranga National Park, that houses the pride of Assam is located in the Golaghat and Nagaon districts of Assam, while it hosts two-thirds of the world’s great one-horned rhinos. They started with just a handful of rhinos and now protect more than 2,400! What contributes to the park’s success where so many others have failed? The park rangers were given legal permission to shoot and kill.
According to reports of the forest department, the rate of poaching-related encounters by the forest guards has reached at a rate of two per month. This offensive yet very successful offensive mode have instilled fear amongst the poachers who were trying to bring the famed one-horned rhino to the brink of extinction. As per the forest department, the results are clear as the number of poachers and also the Rhinos killed dropped dramatically in 2016.
But along with a success in bringing the rhino poaching down to a considerable extent, there has been collateral damages too according to nearby villagers. According to Kachu Kealing, a nearby resident whose only son was shot by rangers in 2013, he is of the view that his son had a disability and might have entered the KNP and strayed into the area while grazing cattle as there are no fences or any signs to mark the border of the park.
While the park authorities are of a different view as according to them the forest guards shot at the boy inside Kaziranga National Park only after he failed to respond to the warning and gunshots fired in the air.