Making Way for Elephants

What is the issue?

Elephants making news for dying on rail tracks is on the rise in recent days.
The incidents remind of the duty of protecting the forests where elephants thrive.

How is the casualty scenario?

Tracks - More than 100 elephants had died on the tracks during 2001-10.
The frequency and number of train kills have, in fact, been rising.
Across India, average annual casualties jumped from 9 during 2000-09 to 17 over the next 7 years.
Others - Trains are actually a minor killer.
Poisoning, poaching, and electrocution together kill more than four times as many elephants.
During 2009-16, more than 500 elephants died this way as against 120 killed on the tracks.

What is the threat?

Only the richest and widest of forests can support elephants.
Elephants migrate long distances along ‘corridors’ that are usually marked by similar vegetation.
Once-contiguous elephant habitats are now fragmented by mines, rail lines and human settlements.
This largely interrupts their transit zones and lead to clashes and casualties.
Elephants thus pay a heavy price as one of the worst victims of India’s development.

What are the limitations with protection?

India’s 668 Protected (forest) Areas cover less than 5% of the country’s area.
India’s 32 elephant reserves (ERs) are spread over 65,000 sq km.
But only less than 30% of this area is legally protected forests.
Centre’s Elephant Task Force recommended declaring the entire ER area as ecologically sensitive under the Environment Protection Act.
This would make another 46,000 sq km out of bounds for miners and developers.
The Task Force also recommended setting up of 10 elephant landscapes around the 32 ERs.
This would require judicious land use in another 45,000 sq km.
But there is reluctance to treat the Protected Areas as sacrosanct.
Attempts to make these stretches as no-go zones are seen as an impediment to growth by many.

What are the other concerns?

National Highways run through 40 of India’s 88 identified elephant corridors.
Putting curbs on speed or night traffic along the ever-expanding linear network makes little economic sense.
Speed restrictions are feasible only in short, singular stretches. E.g.

11km near Berhampore in Odisha
8-km segment through Jharkhand’s Palamu
4-km in the Palghat Gap in the Western Ghats that connects Kerala’s Palakkad and Tamil Nadu’s Coimbatore

However, speed restriction is not an option on steep gradients.
E.g. in Assam’s Karbi Anglong, where to climb, trains must accelerate
In North Bengal, the night speed limit once applied to a total of around 17 km.
It was applied for a series of short stretches of 1-3 km each, in an 80-km segment between Siliguri and Alipurduar.
But since 1-3 km does not cover even the braking distance, trains ran slowly over the entire segment.
Slowing down trains for hours at a stretch would disrupt rail traffic over a large part of the network.

What could be done?

Speed restrictions - This could work better when guided by real-time inputs on elephant movements.
A protocol put in place in Rajaji National Park (Uttarakhand) helped avert elephant casualties for many years.
Followed rigorously, it can be replicated in short stretches elsewhere.
Realignment - There are places where a track, or road, cuts across several wildlife corridors over a longer stretch.
The solution for these junctions could be realignment.
Where realignment is not possible, tracks have to be elevated with underpasses for elephants.
Railways - Not all forest routes can be realigned or elevated overnight.
The Railways must thus prioritise, and balance efficiency and safety while planning projects or expanding existing ones.
Expertise and experience available to find site-specific, science-based solutions for key corridors should be made use of.
Political will - The test lies in the will to implement those remedies irrespective of the cost.
It will take a lot more to secure the elephant’s fragmented and shrinking home, such as giving up on sizeable coal reserves.
Provisions - Elephants mostly travel for water.
Periodic de-siltation of their watering holes will keep them in their areas.
Besides, WTI (Wildlife Trust of India) is testing an automated solar-powered device, EleTrack.
This can detect large animals near the tracks and issue a loud, flashing warning for train drivers.

Source: Indian Express