SC concerned over rising cheetah deaths, says it does not present good picture
New Delhi (PTI): The death of 40 per cent of cheetah translocated from South Africa and Namibia to the Kuno National Park (KNP) in less than one year doesn't present a "good picture", the Supreme Court said on Thursday, and asked the Centre to not make it a prestige issue and explore the possibility of shifting the animals to different sanctuaries.
A bench of Justices BR Gavai, JB Pardiwala and Prashant Kumar Mishra, while voicing concern over the deaths of the feline, asked the Centre to file a detailed affidavit explaining the reasons and remedial measures taken.
"What is the problem? Is the climate not suited or is there anything else. Eight deaths have happened out of 20 Cheetah. Last week there were two deaths. Why don't you explore the possibility of transferring them to different sanctuaries? Why are you making it a prestige issue?
"Please take some positive steps. You should look for possibilities of transferring them to other sanctuaries irrespective of whatever state or government is instead of putting them at one place," the bench told Additional Solicitor General Aishwarya Bhati, who was representing the Centre.
Bhati said the Centre was about to file an affidavit explaining the reasons for the death of the animals and sought an opportunity to submit a detailed affidavit describing the circumstances surrounding each cheetah death.
The government law officer also said the authorities are exploring all possibilities including transferring them to other sanctuaries.
"These eight deaths of cheetah are unfortunate but expected. There were several reasons behind these deaths," the lawyer told the court.
She said it was a prestigious project for the country and authorities are taking all necessary steps to prevent more deaths.
"If the project was so prestigious for the country then 40 per cent deaths of cheetah in less than a year does not present a good picture," the bench said responding to Bhati's assertions.
Senior advocate PC Sen presented some suggestions put forth by experts to prevent the cheetah deaths in KNP.
The bench asked Sen to submit the suggestions to Bhati and asked her to file a response by July 28-29, and listed the matter for August 1.
On July 14, a male cheetah named Suraj, translocated from South Africa, died at KNP, taking the total number of cheetah deaths at the park in Sheopur district since March this year to eight. Another male cheetah, Tejas, brought to KNP from South Africa in February this year had died on July 11.
Besides the death of these two felines, six cheetah, including three cubs born to Namibian cheetah 'Jwala', have died at the national park since March, in a setback to the reintroduction programme launched with much fanfare in September last year.
The top court had on May 18 expressed serious concern over the cheetah deaths at KNP and asked the Centre to rise above politics and consider shifting them to Rajasthan.
It had told the government that from reports of experts and articles, it appears that KNP is not sufficient to accomodate such a large number of cheetah and the union government may consider shifting the animals that went extinct from the country in 1947-48 to other sanctuaries.
The central government had told the court that along with the state government it had arranged for exchange visits, study tours, capacity building and training programmes with African countries as a result of which a significant number of forest officials and veterinarians have been trained and have experience of working with African wildlife species including cheetah.
Some of these officials and veterinarians are actively involved in implementation of Project Cheetah in India, it had said.
The top court is hearing an application filed by the Centre seeking direction from the court that it is no longer necessary for the National Tiger Conservation Authority (NTCA) to continue taking guidance and advice of the expert committee appointed by the apex court through an order dated January 28, 2020.
The top court had said the three-member panel comprising former director of wildlife protection M K Ranjit Sinh, chief conservator of forests, wildlife administration in Uttarakhand Dhananjai Mohan and DIG (Wildlife) of the Ministry of Environment, Forest and Climate Change (MoEFCC) will guide the NTCA in the introduction of African cheetah in India.
On March 28, a day after the first death of cheetah at Kuno, the top court had sought details of experts in the Cheetah Task Force such as their qualification and experience.
The Centre had said in its application that according to the action plan for cheetah introduction in India, annually 8-14 big cats are required to be brought in from African countries at least for the next five years, and a memorandum of understanding to that effect has been signed by the government of India with Namibia and South Africa.
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Not surprised EC gave itself clean chit: Cong slams poll panel on Haryana complaints
Warns ECI of legal action over 'condescending' tone
New Delhi, Nov 1: The Congress on Friday hit out at the Election Commission after it rejected allegations of "irregularities" in Haryana assembly polls, saying if the poll panel's goal is to "strip itself of the last vestiges of neutrality", then it is doing a "remarkable job" at creating that impression.
The opposition party claimed that the EC's reply was written in a tone that is condescending and warned that if the poll panel persists with such language then it would have no choice but to seek legal recourse for getting such remarks expunged.
The Congress's response came days after the EC rejected allegations levelled by it over "irregularities" in assembly polls, saying the party was raising "the smoke of a generic doubt" about the credibility of an entire electoral outcome as done in the past.
The Congress said it is not surprised that the ECI has examined its complaints and "given itself a clean chit". The answer given to the question of the machines' fluctuating batteries seeks to confuse rather than clarify, it said.
"At any rate, the ECI reply is nothing more than a standard and generic set of bullets on how the machines function rather than a specific clarification on specific complaints. In short, while our complaints were specific the ECI response is generic and focused on diminishing the complaints and the petitioners," the Congress said.
In its letter to the EC signed by nine senior Congress leaders, including general secretary in-charge communications Jairam Ramesh, the party said, "We have carefully studied your response to our complaints. Not surprisingly, the ECI has given a clean chit to itself. We would normally have let it be at that. However, the tone and tenor of the ECI's response, the language used, and the allegations made against the INC compel us to submit the counter-response."
The Congress letter said that if the Commission grants a recognised national party a hearing or examines issues raised by them in good faith it is not an 'exception' or 'indulgence' but it is the performance of a duty required to be done.
"If the Commission is refusing to grant us a hearing or refusing to engage on certain complaints (which it has done in the past) then the law allows recourse to the higher courts' extraordinary jurisdiction to compel the ECI to discharge this function (as happened in 2019)," the letter said.
The Congress leaders, who had petitioned the EC alleging irregularities in the polls, said every reply from the EC now "seems to be laced with ad-hominem attacks" on either individual leaders or the party itself.
"The ECI's reply are written in a tone that is condescending. If the current ECI's goal is to strip itself of the last vestiges of neutrality, then it is doing a remarkable job at creating that impression," the party said in its letter to the EC.
"Judges who write decisions do not attack or demonise the party raising the issues. However, if the ECI persists then we shall have no choice but to seek legal recourse to expunge such remarks," said the letter signed by Ramesh, K C Venugopal, Ashok Gehlot, Bhupinder Hooda, Ajay Maken, Abhishek Singhvi, Uday Bhan, Partap Bajwa and Pawan Khera.
They also said that the "pattern" sought to be identified by the ECI in its reply is "disingenuous" as sometimes acting on complaints immediately is the key.
"If they are not redressed on the ground then they become redundant. And then the only remedy available is an Election Petition which is a lengthy process taking years to resolve. Thus, we approach the ECI with whatever information we have, and the ECI with the vast resources at its command, examines and reviews this information to see if the same is correct. Many times, the ECI has found our information to be correct. Other times, not so. But we do not name and shame the ECI for those moments after the Election is over," they said.
The Congress said if they were "bad faith actors", then they would never engage with the ECI to begin with. "We would focus on naming and shaming the Commission with examples from the ECI's own recent history which do not shroud it with glory," it said, adding that they would have never engaged in that case.
The Congress said it has sent over a hundred complaints against the prime minister and home minister, but "the ECI has taken action in precisely zero complaints, while calling our party president and former party president to account for their actions/speeches".
"We would point out how the ECI never published a dissent note, actively suppressing it instead, by a former Commissioner in this regard. We would point out that the ECI has almost always fought any move for transparency and increase in VVPAT verification numbers, with the same having to be ordered by the Supreme Court. We challenge the ECI to fact check the above since it finds the INC's misgivings to be based on phantoms," the Congress said.
In a strongly-worded letter to Congress president Mallikarjun Kharge, the poll panel had said such "frivolous and unfounded" doubts have the potential of creating "turbulence" when crucial steps like polling and counting are in live play, a time when both public and political parties' anxiousness is peaking.
The BJP retained power in Haryana winning 48 of the 90 seats in the October 5 assembly polls.
