Steps Taken for Protection of Elephants In India

Efforts are made to protect and increase the elephant population in the country.  The Central Government is releasing funds for protection and conservation of elephants in the country under the Centrally Sponsored Scheme of Project Elephant.  The Elephant range states have taken various activities to mitigate Man-Elephant conflict, improvement of Elephant Habitat, restoration of Elephant Corridors and various awareness programmes under the scheme.  Some of the activities are as follows:

 1)    Habitat improvements and restoration of Elephant Corridors in PE Range states under PE Scheme (CSS) 

2)    Infrastructure improvement in Elephant Reserves for effective management of elephant population.

3)    Anti depredation squads, anti poaching squads and trekkers are engaged for protection of elephants.

4)    To restrict menace of elephants to human habitations, solar fencing, trenches and stone waling are being provided in the depredation prone localities.

5)    Studies on various issues such as man animal conflict, carrying capacity of elephant habitat are encouraged.

6)    Awareness programme among the local villagers are taken to minimize the loss of life of the wild elephants.

7)    For better management of Wild Elephants, 28 Elephant Reserves have been established by the states.

8)    To secure the future of the elephants in India, the Ministry of Environment and Forests has constituted an Elephant Task Force which has submitted its report “Gajah” to the Ministry in 2010.

9)    To monitor and review the CSS scheme of PE, a steering committee has been constituted by the Ministry.

10)    As per one of the decisions in the 6^th meeting of NBWL, a committee for strengthening of Elephant Reserves and elephant corridors has been constituted in January, 2013.

11)    As per one of the Elephant Task Force recommendations, creation of National Elephant Conservation Authority (NECA) is under process.

12)    Joint advisories have been issued by Ministry of Environment and Forests (MoEF) and Ministry of Railways (MoRs) to all the concerned states to avoid deaths of elephants by speeding trains.

            The number of elephants in the country where project elephant have been implemented, area-wise and state-wise is given below:-

Population of wild elephants as reported by States

REGION	STATE	ELEPHANT POPULATION
		1993	1997	2002	2007
North-East	Arunachal Pradesh	2102	1800	1607	1690
	Assam	5524	5312	5246	5281
	Meghalaya	2872	1840	1868	1811
	Nagaland	178	158	145	152
	Mizoram	15	22	33	12
	Manipur	50	30	12	-
	Tripura	100	70	40	59
	West Bengal (North)	186	250	292	300-350
Total for North-East		11027	9482	9243	9305-9355
East	West Bengal (South)	14	26	36	25
	Jharkhand	550	618	772	624
	Orissa	1750	1800	1841	1862
	Chhattisgarh	-	-	-	122
Total for East		2314	2444	2649	2633
North	Uttarakhand	828	1130	1582	1346
	Uttar Pradesh	47	70	85	380
Total for North		875	1200	1667	1726
South	Tamil Nadu	2307	2971	3052	3867
	Karnataka	5500	6088	5838	4035
	Kerala	3500	3600	3850	6068
	Andhra Pradesh	46	57	74	28
	Maharashtra	-	-	-	7
Total for South		11353	12716	12814	14005
GRAND TOTAL		25569	25842	26373	27669-27719