Tracking the tiger
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COMMENTS 
Krishnendu Bose’s Tiger -- The Death Chronicles -- examines the failure of India’s efforts to protect the tiger. It also highlights solutions
Documentary filmmaker Krishnendu Bose travelled through eight states of India for 14 months and canned 70 hours of footage before he was satisfied that he had enough material to make a convincing statement about the failure of efforts to protect the tiger, particularly the efforts of the government. The result, a 63-minute film titled Tiger -- The Death Chronicles, is also a statement on the way we look at our forests, at conservation, and at development. “The fact that we haven’t been very successful in saving the tiger to the extent that we should have, compels us to rethink our perspectives, our engagement with governance and clearly our accountability to ourselves,” said Bose after the film’s screening at the Vatavaran Film Festival in New Delhi, held from September 12 to 16, 2007.
This is the first time that a film joins diverse voices, from tiger scientists and conservationists to ordinary citizens, to attempt a brutal and honest assessment of the present and future of the Indian tiger and its habitat. According to latest government estimates, India’s tiger population is in the range of 1,300 to 1,500 -- a considerable drop from 3,642 tigers in 2001. Central India has witnessed a dramatic fall of 65% in tiger population as forests are being cut for mining and other commercial purposes. Encroachment on the tigers’ habitat has led to a drastic fall in numbers and forced the animals into conflict with man.
Bose’s film shows how natives have teamed up with forest department officials at the Jim Corbett National Park in Uttaranchal and the Biligiri Ranga Temple (BRT) Wildlife Sanctuary in Andhra Pradesh, to help tigers survive. The International Union for Nature and Natural Resources (IUCN) recently rated the Corbett National Park as one of the best managed tiger reserves in the country.
Both these reserves, as Bose points out, have something in common: local residents depend on the forest for their sustenance. In the process of providing for themselves they conserve the forest, helping in the protection of the tiger. In BRT, tribals worship the tiger.
Elaborating on the making of this film, Bose says that after 20 years of filming the wild he was tempted to focus on the mechanics of conservation. “It is difficult to make these kinds of films because the bureaucracy has a way of leading you down blind alleys. The attempt is to discover the truth and lay it bare. Also, as a filmmaker, it is important to maintain an objective distance and not let personal bias creep into the narrative,” he adds.
Significantly, the film does not stop at showcasing the problem and letting the involved parties have their say. It goes a step further to provide a way out. “One way is to look at how indigenous dwellers of the forest can be made participants in saving the tiger, and, secondly, we have to start asking questions to make the government answerable. This is now possible through the Right to Information Act,” Bose says.
Bose has managed to pin down several untruths. As in the case of the Buxa Reserve, in West Bengal, where tiger sightings have become extremely rare even though government records consistently state that there are more than 30 tigers in the demarcated forest. Raghu Chandawat, who radio-collared six tigers in Buxa, says that three big cats went missing without a trace in the space of two years. The field director of the reserve denies this.
The attempt to provide a balanced perspective leads Bose to explore two different perspectives on the tiger-human conflict. The view held by experts like Valmik Thapar and former director of Project Tiger P K Sen is that human interference should not be allowed, and all 5,000 villages that fall within tiger reserves should be relocated. On the other hand, environmentalists like Sunita Narain of the Centre for Science and Environment suggest relocation only in extreme cases.
Even though Bose’s film does not focus on the ‘trade’ issue too much, one fact that cannot be ignored is that there are now plans to legalise the sale of tiger parts from tiger farms in East Asia. Lobbyists for legalising tiger trade argue that flooding the market with farmed animals will reduce the value of the tiger and, therefore, profits from poaching. But, as Vinod Thomas of the World Bank points out, opening up even limited trade will only increase the hunting of tigers in the wild. Why? Because poaching in India costs only $ 40 to $ 60 a tiger, while maintaining one in captivity in East Asia costs between $ 2,000 and $ 4,000. The cost difference says it all.
Krishnendu Bose can be contacted at
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(Huned Contractor is a freelance journalist and filmmaker based in Pune)
InfoChange News & Features, October 2007