GUWAHATI, May 25 - The 111.19-sq km Dehing Patkai Wildlife Sanctuary formed out of the 575-sq km Dehing Patkai Elephant Reserve in 2004 had the potential to have a much larger area for providing a secure home to the region�s varied wildlife and flora but pressure from the coal lobby scuttled such a move.
Indeed, if conservationists who have been pressing for a long time for expanding the area of the sanctuary are to be believed, the government could have easily declared the sanctuary with an area of at least 350 sq km, if not the entire 575 sq km.
This is something to which even some forest officials agree.
�The region has many unique aspects, not the least it being the last vestiges of the Northeast�s rainforests. It shelters diverse wildlife and plants � many of which are endemic to these rainforests. Two decades back, the forests were not much fragmented and declaring the sanctuary with an area three times its present size would have been possible. But the government put more thrust on keeping a large tract as reserve forests for revenue-generating productive purposes,� a forest official wishing anonymity told The Assam Tribune.
But rampant deforestation due to coal mining � both illegal and legal � is now eroding vast tracts of reserve forests, frustrating the objective of sustainable use of forest resources. �Had the government put more emphasis on declaring a larger area as sanctuary and promoted eco-tourism, that would have served the goal of sustainable development better, as the forests and the natural environment would have remained intact,� he said.
The presence of a sizeable elephant population in the Dehing Patkai range and also the tiger further buttresses the claim for expanding the current area of the sanctuary. It also shelters the State�s biggest hoolock gibbon population in addition to five species of primates and four species of lesser cats. Another crucial aspect that can help long-term wildlife conservation is its contiguity with the Arunachal forests, including the Deomali Elephant Reserve.
The actual area of the Dehing Patkai rainforests � classified as Assam Valley Tropical Wet Evergreen Forests � extends to 934 sq km covering the districts of Dibrugarh, Tinsukia and Sivasagar, and bordering Arunachal Pradesh. But much of it lies degraded and fragmented.
There has been a sustained demand from conservation circles for increasing the sanctuary�s area by adding the entire stretch of Jeypore, Upper Dehing and Dirok reserve forests in Dibrugarh and Tinsukia districts.
�The present size of the sanctuary is small to cater to its diverse wildlife, especially elephants. The animals naturally use the contagious forested areas, i.e., reserve forests, but those areas hardly have any protection mechanism. Even the government had assured that the sanctuary�s area would be expanded in a phased manner. That has not happened. Ideally it should be manned by a wildlife division but it is still looked after by the Digboi Forest Division,� a conservationist said, adding that not attaching it to a separate wildlife division resulted in compromises in security to the sanctuary.
Conservationists warn that with rampant coal mining going on unabated in the elephant reserve, bringing the contiguous reserve forests under the sanctuary would be the best option for saving the rainforests and its famed wildlife.
The wildlife of Dehing Patkai includes elephant, tiger, leopard, clouded leopard, Himalayan black bear, hog badger, jungle cat, leopard cat, fishing cat, marbled cat, wild boar, sambar, barking deer, gaur, serow, Malayan giant squirrel, porcupine, pig-tailed macaque, flying fox, slow loris, stump-tailed macaque, Assamese macaque, rhesus macaque, capped langur, hoolock gibbon, rock python, king cobra, Asian leaf turtle, monitor lizard, etc., besides over 300 species of birds.
