India: Bihar to sterilise blue bulls and monkeys over crop damage
Farmers forced to switch to paddy and wheat farming from growing vegetables
Patna: Alarmed at the animals damaging crops, the Bihar government has planned to sterilise blue bulls and monkeys to control their population. So far, the government had allowed culling of blue bulls or Asian antelopes but the move evoked wide protests from animal rights activists.
Bihar minister for environment, forest and climate change department Niraj Kumar Singh recently held a meeting with officials from forest department and veterinary doctors over the growing population of blue bulls and monkeys.
* Males are gray-blue, while females have reddish-brown coats. Their body type is similar to that of a deer on steroids.
* Blue bulls live throughout most of India. Their range extends from the northeast border of Pakistan south. The southernmost extent of their range lies near Bengaluru, India.
* The eastern extent of their distribution stops short of the western border of Bangladesh. A sliver of their range also extends into southern Nepal. Their populations are most common in northern India.
* They have long necks, small heads, and muscular bodies. Their coat colors vary between males and females, but both sexes have a white patch of fur directly under their chins. Male Blue Bulls have short horns, which are usually less than a foot long.
* Humans and Blue Bulls interact frequently because they live in regions with high human populations. In many areas, people view these animals as pests, or even vermin, because they feed on crops. People also hunt these antelopes for their meat.
Various suggestions came up at the meeting about how to control their growing population. They included hunting, live capture and relocation, reproductive/fertility control, temporary rehabilitation and rescue centre and on-the-spot castration.
After receiving the suggestions, the state government now plans to sterilize these two animals. As a pilot project, the government plans to launch it from Motihar areas of Tirhut Forest Division in north Bihar. The government has also announced plans to set up a temporary camp at Motipur for this purpose.
“We are working on a pilot project to solve the issue. Based on its success, it will be implemented in other parts of the state,” forest minister told the media. Local divisional forest officer Sanjay Prakash said they had not received any communication so far from the government although various issues were discussed in the meeting with the minister.
So far, the state government had allowed the culling of blue bulls in the state in view of growing protests by the farmers in various parts of the state. Subsequently, a professional shooter was hired from Hyderabad to kill the antelopes. Some 300 antelopes were shot later but the culling had to be halted in view of protests from the animal rights activists.
Such has been the impact of the antelope menace that the poor farmers were forced to give up farming of vegetables which fetched them handsome money. Now the villagers are dependent on mainly traditional farming of only paddy and wheat.
“We were having attractive income from vegetable farming but now we have stopped it due to continuing damage of crops by antelopes,” said Arun Singh, a farmer from Bhojpur district. Antelope menace prevails in various districts such as Patna, Bhojpur, Kaimur, Buxur, Vaishali, East Champaran, Supaul and Nalanda. Several districts are also in the grip of monkey menace.
The growing population of these two animals has become a matter of concern in Bihar. Especially, the blue menace has robbed the sleep of the farmers who find their crops getting damaged at a large scale in various districts of Bihar every year. The fleet-footed animals regularly forage into agricultural fields in search of food, heaping more misery on the farmers already faced with escalating input costs and declining remunerative prices for their produce.
Officials cite the state’s dwindling forest cover behind the growing menace. According to them, they have been invading the agricultural fields of farmers after finding their natural habitats captured by the human population.