Sources have stated that the Women and Child Development Minister Maneka Gandhi on Thursday has catapulted an unexpected attack on her ministerial colleague Prakash Javadekar, accusing the Environment Ministry led by him of carrying out state-mandated killing of a large number of protected wild animals in several parts of the country.
Meanwhile Javadekar has exercised restraint in responding; only pointing out that the killing of wild animals in certain states was being done in accordance with law and on the request of state governments. But, he has got one of his officers to issue a statement asserting that the ministry had only given permission for scientific management after examining requests from state governments.
The Environment Ministry issued a clarification that more than 500 people lost their lives in human-wildlife conflicts. There are standard operating processes laid down in the Wildlife Protection Act, 1972 to kill wild animals damaging human life or crops.
S K Khanduri, Inspector General (Wildlife) has said that there were complaints about wild boar, blue bull (nilgai) and other animals and accordingly, these proposals have been examined and given permission for scientific management for a limited time for a specific area in the three states of Uttarakhand, Bihar and Himachal Pradesh. Proposals of Maharashtra are still being examined.
