When Prime Minister of India Mr Narendra Modi was taking with me
on "Mann ki baat", he mentioned about 5th June: the world environment
day. The theme for 2016 is "Fight against the Illegal Trade in
Wildlife" kept by United Nations.The illegal wildlife trade is one of the
biggest threats and Wildlife crime is increasing just like drug
trafficking, human smuggling and money laundering.Number of endangered species
is decreasing day by day. It is become favourite business of organised criminal
groups. Black market got better option to earn money easily due to
insufficient vigilance, laws related to wildlife crimes,Corruption,
toothless laws and weak judicial systems. This is not directly related to
wildlife crimes, it can be extended to exploitation of natural resources
without any control. These type of activities somehow affects wildlife. As
per worldwildlife fund says 2,500 elephants was seized in the 13
largest seizures of illegal ivory in 2011. Poaching threatens the last of our
wild tigers that number around 3,890.
Question arises, how illegal trade take birth. Answer is from
legal reasons. legally using timber for furniture or building materials, trade of exotic
flowers, plants or pets, ‘wild’ ingredients sourced for medicines and
cosmetics are legal and clothes, shoes or bags made from, for example,
reptile skins are legal as well as famous. Sometimes people take these this as
status symbol. Demand of these items are very high which leads to illegal
activities. Rhino horn, elephant ivory, reptiles skim and tiger products
continue to command high prices among consumers.
This is coincidence or not, I don't know. But in same
year Ramgopal Verma is bringing movie Veerappan. Veerappan was a dacoit
and involved in illegal wildlife trading.He became challenge for government system. when veerappan killed, organised crime in india moved towards this business. some news came across us like Seizure on 1st Feb. 2005, by Delhi Police - Raid on the basement of a warehouse in Patel Nagar. The haul consisted
of:
39 leopard
skins (including one snow leopard), 2 tiger skins, 42 otter skins, 3kg of tiger
claws,14 tiger canines, 10
tiger jaw bones, About 135 kg
of porcupine quills, 60 kg of tiger and leopard paws, 20 small pieces of bone
that appear to be tiger and leopard 'floating' clavicle bones. and Blackbuck poaching case of Salmaan Khan.
There are lots of news to share regarding these types of crime, the need of the hour is to realize and make tuff laws. Make awareness to the local people, because they are the persons who can help government to stop these activities, non other military can do that.
