Tumakuru: While hunting Chinkaras and Blackbucks has landed Bollywood superstar, Salman Khan in jail, forest officials of Tumakuru are doing everything they can to protect these endangered species and have come up with a proposal for setting up a Chinkara Wildlife Sanctuary in the "unique landscape" of Bukkapatna.
It was camera trappings by scientist Sanjay Gubbi that first showed the presence of the Chinkaras in the Tumakuru forests in March/April 2015. Although Mr Gubbi was using the cameras to understand leopard densities in the region, they threw up a surprise in the Chinkaras, and Blackbucks in Bukkapatna and adjoining areas of the district.
The forests of Tumakuru are also home to the striped hyenas and have a healthy leopard and bear population as well.
Deputy Conservator of Forests, Ramalinge Gowda, is confident that the proposal for a Chinkara Wildlife Sanctuary submitted by his department last September, will be approved by the State Wildlife Board. Once declared a sanctuary the department will be able to set up anti-predation/poaching camps in sensitive places, procure arms and ammunition for the protection of the wildlife, and also promote research he explains.
Arguing his case for a sanctuary , he says the landscape is unique and these reserved forest are contiguous, which is uncommon in the drier parts of the state. “In addition, the animals are protected under schedule 1 of the Wildlife Protection Act 1972,” he notes.
