While the great Indian middle class obsesses with cricket and corruption, an epic three-way battle is unfolding in forests across the country. It is time to take notice, and a stand. Because, more than anything else, the outcome of this tussle will decide India’s future
How dubious science and faulty equipment created a far-fetched feel-good number. And how the World Bank is back to dominate India’s tiger agenda within three years of a PMO snub
For decades, foresters have relied on pugmarks to tell the gender and identity of tigers. But pugs often lie, as they did in Corbett recently. Open tracks a few alpha males with ‘female’ footprints
It is a reckless script gone so horribly wrong that a happy ending is unbelievable, if not impossible. A desperate mother seeking shelter far from her forest home in the fields to save her two cubs from murderous males; villagers living the terror of running into big cats amid standing crop they cannot afford to abandon; forest ground staff trying hard to avert conflict that could end all hope for the tiger family. This could well be a tragedy of circumstance but for the villains of the piece
Behind the face-off between the wildlife tourism lobby and the Ministry of Environment and Forests lies a network of hidden interests that exercises monopoly power and prospers on hypocrisy and corruption. More than stricter regulations, it’s time for transparency
The latest death of a translocated tiger reiterates how Sariska continues to stand for everything that could have gone wrong with conservation in India.
TCA Raghavan is a former Indian High Commissioner to Pakistan and Singapore. His first book, Attendant Lords: Abdur Rahim and Bairam Khan: Courtiers and Poets in Mughal India, was awarded the Mohammad Habib Prize by the Indian History Congress. He is also the author of The People Next Door: The Curious History of India’s Relations with Pakistan and History Men: Jadunath Sarkar, G S Sardesai, Raghubir Sinh and Their Quest for India’s Past. His latest book is Circles of Freedom: Love, Friendship and Loyalty in the Indian National Struggle