States fail to give Ministry details of elephant reserves

• Elephant range States across India have ignored an instruction from MoEFCC to furnish information on their elephant reserves.

Wildlife Institute data

• Data on Wildlife Institute of India’s website say elephant population across 16 States in the country ranged between 27,785 and 31,368 in 2012.
• Karnataka had up to 7,458 elephants followed by Assam with 5,281, Maharashtra had only four.
• India has 30 notified elephant reserves, spread across 15 Elephant Range States.
• There are 10 sites for the MIKE (Monitoring of Illegal Killing of Elephants) programme, mandated by Conference of Parties to the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species.
• MIKE sites:
• Chirang-Ripu and Dihing-Patkai in Assam, Deomali in Arunachal Pradesh, Garo Hills in Meghalaya, Eastern Dooars in West Bengal, Mayurbhanj in Odisha, Shivalik in Uttarakhand, Mysore in Karnataka, Wayanad in Kerala and Nilgiri in Tamil Nadu.

Prelims take away

• Wildlife Institute of India
• MIKE (Monitoring of Illegal Killing of Elephants)
• Elephant reserves in India