Team Blitz India
THE Kerala Government has decided to form an interstate coordination committee to monitor the movement of wild animals across state borders.
Wayanad district, which has been witnessing higher number of man-animal conflicts recently, will receive two more Rapid Response Teams (RRT) in addition to the one it has now.
An inter-state coordination committee will be formed which will discuss the further course of action. As of now, there are three forest divisions in Wayanad. A special cell for these three divisions will be formed and a nodal officer will coordinate the functions. In this regard, out of 500 beat forest officers, 170 will be posted in Wayanad.
As per state forest department there was a delay in receiving information from the Karnataka department regarding the movement of the elephant. Kerala has no facility to receive information from the chip installed by Karnataka or Tamil Nadu. Hence, state government has decided to form an inter-state coordination committee to avoid elephants trampling civilians.
To control the man-animal conflict, which includes the venturing of wild animals into human habitat, amendments need to be made to the concerned Forest Act, which only the Union Government can do, the Kerala Government has pointed out.
The Kerala BJP has alleged that despite the presence of a radio collar, the Kerala forest department failed to warn the people about the venturing of the wild elephant.
