“Collared” tigers
This letter is in response to K. Ullas Karanth's letter dated 23rd March 2008 in this section titled "Collared" tigers.
K. Ullas Karanth's letter in defence of his colleague is understandable, but we would still like to hear from Mr. Adam about our so called misdirected concerns?. Mr. Adam has collared two tigers so far and both of them are dead. According to the research of Mr. Karanth there is a 20% mortality rate in the wild population of tigers, therefore one in every five tiger would die of natural causes. Mr. Karanth tries to rationalise the death of the two tigers in Mr. Adam's hand as normal.
The percentage of mortality in this case is not 20% but 100%. Both of Mr. Adam's collared tigers died within a span of seven to six months. Do Mr. Adam and Mr. Karanth feel that there is no relationship whatsoever to the collaring process and death of the two tigers? Perhaps there is none, but shouldn't one at least try to find out if there might be a connection? Yet we find no indication of an investigation, and this is where our concern is. Mr. Adam restarted the collaring process without evaluating what happened to the two tigers. Furthermore, he tried to hide the fact that his second collared tiger was also dead. In the documentary called “Ganges” by BBC you can clearly see the condition of the second tiger. Mr. Adam chooses to re-tranquilize the second tiger to take the collar off in this film, while the narrator implies in the film that Mr. Adam is actually tranquilizing the tiger to put the collar on. But freeze the part where he fires the dirt gun and you see the tiger is already collared. So why is he removing the collar?
Is it to retrieve the data? But the collar is supposed to disengage on its own and then collected. Or is it for the sake of filming for BBC? Perhaps he chose to remove the collar sensing impending death of the tiger. Whatever his reasons maybe, he choose to put his priorities ahead of the tiger's. No matter what Mr. Karanth would have us believe, tranquilization is not without its inherent risks, and Mr. Adam chose to put this already very sick collared tiger to further risk that perhaps ended its life.
Mr. Karanth's analogy of bird banding with tiger collaring is quiet laughable. And I am quiet sure there would be a great uproar if you tried to band a bird like the Jerdon's Courser knowing there was even a 10% risk of killing it.
The days of killing your subject for the sake of science are gone, especially with species like tigers where there is already the pressure of poaching and, according to Mr. Karanth, a 20% natural mortality rate. The method employed by Mr. Adam to tranquilize the tiger involves snaring the tiger with cables first. This is an extremely cruel process that can severely injure a tiger.
We have nothing against genuine tiger research, but there should be a proper mechanism to monitor and evaluate the process. Unfortunately, in Bangladesh we haven't seen that so far. Mr. Karanth advises the government of Bangladesh to heed the lessons from across the border. I think it has heeded foreign lessons for too long.
We have lost almost all of our Sal forests to Acacia plantation due to foreign consultants, our coastal wetlands to intensive shrimp cultivation, and many more. It is time we decided on our own what is best for us.
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