Filmmaker says Few Tigers Left in India

Filmmaker says Few Tigers Left in India



May 2007 -  In his new film on India's tiger 
crisis, conservation filmmaker Krishnendu Bose argues that there may be 
less than 1,000 wild tigers remaining in India. 
Called "Tiger: The Death Chronicles," the 63 minute film in English had 
its premier today at the India International Centre Auditorium in New 
Delhi. 
"Basically it's a film to share the truth with the people of the country," 
Bose told ENS in an interview. "I've realized [while shooting that there 
are] a lot of things even I didn't know as a filmmaker, as a person 
involved with conservation." 

Have camera, will travel. Krishnendu Bose specializes in conservation 
films. 
In 1995, Bose established the Delhi-based film studio EarthCare 
Productions and serves as its director. He also is managing trustee in the 
EarthCare Outreach Trust. 
"Transparency is completely gone," said Bose. "We have trusted the state, 
we trusted NGOs and groups of individuals. But after trusting them for 30 
years, they have completely let us down." 
"This film is not only a blame-game. It's about ourselves, and whether 
people like us have cared for the tiger," he said. 
"There are two questions," said Bose. "Is there any political will? Is 
there will from the people to save the tiger? For the last 30 years, 
largely nobody has shown that will." 
"There's been a sensational government figure emerging from a presentation 
made in Kathmandu, though not yet officially released, that says there are 
less than 300 tigers left in the large central Indian state of Madhya 
Pradesh," said Bose. 
"The official figures of tigers in Madhya Pradesh is 700. MP is known as 
'The Tiger State.' Experts consider MP as one of main hopeful areas for 
the tiger. If you calculate this, then all the tigers across India could 
touch a figure as low as a thousand. It's a very critical state. Our tiger 
figures have never gone down to this level ever," Bose said. 
A tiger in Kanha National Park, a tiger reserve in the state of Madhya 
Pradesh. 
He said even in 1972, the earlier flashpoint when awareness of the tiger 
touched its high under the then Prime Minister Indira Gandhi, things were 
not so bad. 
"The tiger, the symbol of India, and one of the most charismatic animals 
to walk the face of the Earth, faces its most severe crisis today," he 
said.


 
The tiger's prey, habitat and the animal itself "are being decimated" Bose 
found while traveling through "tiger hotspots" like Sariska, Panna and 
Buxa. He says the film attempts to "unravel the nuts and bolts of the 
crisis." 
Bose says his film looks at states like Madhya Pradesh, Orissa and Goa and 
"how they may be trading their tigers and their forests, for more economic 
revenue." 
Tiger in Corbett National Park 
The film maps the case of a mining project in the heart of a tiger habitat 
in Orissa. It also highlights the positive work being done in reserves 
like Corbett National Park and up in the BR Hills Wildlife Sanctuary of 
Karnataka state in southern India. 
Voices from the film include tiger conservationist Valmik Thapar, who 
says, "The crisis comes from absolutely low-grade governance by the state 
governments and the Central government." 
"The tiger has lost out because tiger conservation has become the domain 
of a group of people who don't connect with a larger number of people," 
Sunita Narain, chairperson of the Tiger Task Force, says on camera. 
"When a species is down to four to five percent of its original range, in 
many areas it will go," says tiger scientist Dr. Ulhas Karanth. 
"For the first time ever," Bose told ENS, "a film joins diverse voices, 
from tiger scientists and conservationists to ordinary citizens, to 
attempt a brutal and an honest assessment of the present and the future of 
the Indian tiger and its habitat." 
       
      

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