A 55-year-old housewife was recently arrested by the Haveli police for possessing horns of a bison without obtaining a licence. The incident has brought to light, the issue of registering wildlife trophies all over again. Forest department officials say no new wildlife trophies have been registered since 2005 and blame ignorance of people for it.
Anita Ramchandra Raskar, a resident of Dhayari, was arrested by Haveli police on Wednesday for alleged involvement in possessing horns of a bison. Raskar was using the bison horns to decorate her house.
The police say Anita, in her statement, told them that she bought the bison horns for Rs550 during a trip to Kodaikanal in Tamil Nadu. They say they took action against Anita after a tip-off. The action was taken because Anita had not registered the wildlife trophy with the authorities.
However, Anita may not be the only one failing to register the wildlife trophies with forest department. There could be many like her in Pune.
According to the deputy conservator of forest (wildlife) RS Kadam, “Registration of wildlife trophies is not happening any more. The registrations were being made only till 2005.’’
Kadam says, “Different situations involving wildlife trophies can attract different actions. There are many cases where the reason of non-registry of such items is genuine or just plain ignorance.’’
The possession of items related to animals listed in from schedule I and II of the Wildlife Protection Act are treated equal to the crime of poaching.
“We confiscate the trophies and punish the people as per the law, but in the recent past, there has been neither such registry nor any action was taken against anyone,” adds Kadam.
In Raskar’s case, the trophy in question was a pair of bison horns in her house. The Gaur or Indian bison (Bos gaurus) is a scheduled animal figuring in List 1 of mammals in the Wildlife Protection Act, 1972.
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