Pattern and Characterisation of Human casualties in Sundarban by Tiger attacks, India

Chandan Surabhi Das

Article ID: 873
Vol 1, Issue 1, 2018

VIEWS - 816 (Abstract) 742 (PDF)

Abstract


A large number of people of the fringe areas of Sundarban enter into the forests every year and encounter with the tigers simply for their livelihood. This study attempts to examine the extent and impact of human-animal conflicts in the Sundarban Reserve Forest (SRF) area in West Bengal, India. An intensive study of the data of the victims (both death and injury) between 1999 and 2014 reveals that, fishermen crab collector, honey collectors and woodcutters are generally victimized by the tiger attack. Pre monsoon period (April to June) and early winter period (Jan to March) are noted for the two-peak periods for casualties. Maximum casualty occurs between 8-10 am, and 2-4 pm. Jhilla (21.1%), Pirkhali (19.72 %), Chandkhali (11.72%), and Arbesi (9.35%) are the four most vulnerable forest blocks accounting more than 60 per cent occurrence of incidences. 67.24 per cent of the tiger attack victims were residents of Gosaba followed by Hingalganja (15%) and Basanti, (9.76%). The vulnerability rating puts the risk of tiger attack to 0.88 for every 10,000 residents of Gosaba block followed by 0.33 at Hingalganj Block and 0.11 at Bansanti Block. The majority of the victims (68%) were found to be males, aged between 30 and 50 years.


Keywords


Sundarban, Fringe village, Human-wildlife conflict, Depredation, Forest entrants

Full Text:

PDF


References


1. Reference

2. Carbone, C, Gittelman JL. 2002. A common rule for the scaling of carnivore density. Science 295: 2273—2276.

3. Carnivores readily come into conflict with humans because of their protein-rich diet, high fecundity, predatory behaviour and social organization patterns.

4. Chakrabarty K.1986. Tiger (Panthera tigris tigris) in the mangrove forests of Sundarbans e an ecological study. Tigerpaper 13 (2), 8-11.

5. Chaudhuri A , Choudhury A. 1994. Mangroves of the Sundarban. Volume : India. IUCN, Gland, Switzerland.

6. Das CS. 2005. Tiger Straying Hazards in Sundarban, West Bengal. Geographical Review of India 67(1): 80-87.

7. Das CS. 2009. Spatio-temporal study of the hazards induced by tiger attack in Sundarban, West Bengal. Indian Journal of landscape systems and Ecological Studies 32 (1): 330-338.

8. Das CS. 2011. Characterization and prevention of large carnivore-human conflict in Sundarban: a study of tiger straying incidents. In Sundarbans- issues & threats, ed. K. Naskar, A. Bhattacharya, 16-27. Central Inland Fisheries Research Institute (ICAR), Kolkata.

9. Das CS. 2015. Causes, Consequences and Cost-Benefit Analysis of the Conflicts Caused by Tiger Straying Incidents in Sundarban, India. Proceedings of the Zoological Society 68 (2): 120-130.

10. Das CS, Bandyopadhyay.S. 2012. Sharing Space: Human-Animal Conflicts in Indian Sundarban. Progressive Publishers, Kolkata

11. Hendricks H. 1975. The status of the tiger Pantheratigris (Linne 1758) in the Sundarban Mangrove forest (Bay of Bengal). Saingetierkundliche Mitteilungen 23 (3):161-199.

12. Inskip C,Zimmermann A. 2009. Human–felid conflict: a review of patterns and priorities worldwide. Oryx 43, 18-34.

13. Johnson A, Vongkhamheng C, Hedemark M,et al. 2004. The status of tiger, prey and human-tiger conflict in the Nam Et - Phou Louey National Protected Area. Wildlife Conservation Society, Vientiane.

14. Karanth KU. 2002. Human-carnivore conflict: strategies for mitigation and prevention, 2002 State of Carnivore Science, Society for Conservation Biology. Bronx, New York.

15. Khan MMH. 2002. The Sundarban. In Wilderness: Earth’s Last Wild Places (eds R.A. Mittermeier, C. Goettsch Mittermeier, P. Robles Gil & J. Pilgrim), pp. 280-289. Conservation International, Arlington, USA.

16. Macdonald DW,C Sillero-Zubiri. 2002. Large carnivores and conflict: Lion conservation in context. In Lion conservation research Workshop 2: modelling conflict, ed. AJ Loveridge, T Lynam, DW Macdonald, 1-8. Wildlife Conservation Research Unit, Oxford University.

17. McDougal C. 1987. The Man-eating tiger in geographical and historical perspective. In Tigers of the World: The Biology, Biopolitics, Management and Conservation of an Endangered Species, ed. R.L. Tilson and R.S. Seal, 435-488. Park Ridge, New Jersey, Noyes Publications.

18. Nyhus, PJ,Tilson R. 2004. Characterizing human–tiger conflict in Sumatra, Indonesia: implications for conservation. Oryx 38: 68–74.

19. Pargiter FE. 1934. A Revenue History of the Sundarbans from 1765 to 1870. Bengal Govt. Press, Calcutta.

20. Saberwal VK,Gibbs JP,Chellam R,et al.1994. Lion–human conflict in the Gir forest, India. Conservation Biology 8: 501–507.

21. Weladji RB,Tchamba MN. 2003. Conflict between people and protected areas within the Bénoué Wildlife Conservation Area, North Cameroon. Oryx, 37, 72-77.

22. Wikramanayake ED, Dinerstein E,Robinson G,et al.1999. Where can tigers live in the future? A framework for identifying high-priority areas for the conservation of tigers in the wild, pp. 255–272. In: Seidensticker, J., S. Christie & P. Jackson (eds.). Riding the Tiger: Tiger Conservation in Human-dominated Landscapes. Cambridge University Press, Cambridge, UK.

23. Zhang E, George B,Schaller Lü Zhi,et al.2002. Tiger Predation 0n Livestock in Gedang, Wildlife Conservation Society, Tibet, China.




DOI: https://doi.org/10.24294/sf.v1i2.873

Refbacks

  • There are currently no refbacks.


Copyright (c) 2018 Chandan Surabhi Das

Creative Commons License
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0 International License.

This site is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License.