Did Raveen Tandon’s safari vehicle flout norms at Satpura Tiger Reserve?

What happens in India’s tiger reserves, doesn’t stay in India’s tiger reserves, especially if a celebrity is visiting. Case in point: Bollywood actor and wildlife lover Raveena Tandon’s recent visit to Satpura Tiger Reserve in Madhya Pradesh that is making headlines, with a great deal of hand-wringing over rules being flouted.

So what happened in Satpura?

Tandon was on a jeep safari in the Satpura forest, when a tigress was spotted. In a video, which has gone viral on social media, you can hear camera clicks. As the animal approaches, the actor can be heard asking that the vehicle be backed.

In the video, posted on Instagram by Tandon, the striped cat growls at the vehicle and then continues into the forest.

What are authorities saying?

Authorities at the Satpura Tiger Reserve have started a probe as they claimed the vehicle was too close to the tigress. Sub Divisional Officer (SDO) of Forest Dheeraj Singh Chouhan on Tuesday said following the directives of senior officials, he has started a probe into the alleged incident.

The vehicle driver and the officials on duty there will be served a notice and questioned, the official said. The probe report will be submitted to senior officials for further action, he said.

What is Tandon saying?

Tandon on Wednesday said she was travelling in a jeep licensed by the forest department which didn’t deviate from the designated “tourism path”.

The actor, who visited the reserve on 22 November, in a tweet said she was accompanied on the safari by trained guides and drivers provided by the department. “A tiger gets close to the deputy rangers bike. One can never predict when and how tigers will react. It’s the Forest Department licensed vehicle,with their guides and drivers who are trained to know their boundaries and legalities,” she tweeted.

In another tweet, she added, “Tigers are kings of where they roam. We are silent spectators. Any sudden movements can startle them as well.”

“Luckily for us , that we did not take any sudden action, but sat quiet and watched the tigress, move on. We we’re on the tourism path, which mostly these tigers cross. And Katy the tigress in this video aswell, is habituated to coming close to vehicles and snarling,” she wrote.

Tandon is an avid wildlife lover and has often called out misbehaviour and flouting of rules in tiger reserves.

Earlier this month, authorities at the Van Vihar National Park, located in Bhopal, started an investigation after Tandon shared a video and claimed some miscreants were throwing stones at a tiger enclosure in the park. “Tourists ( ruffians ) pelting stones at the tiger in closures. Having a good laugh when told not to do so. Screaming laughing, shaking the cage- throwing rocks. No security for the tiger. humiliation they are subjected to,” she tweeted.

Park authorities had said they were investigating the incident. Such acts are punishable under the Wildlife Protection Act, they had said. In a tweet, the park management clarified, “Van Vihar National Park follows Zero Tolerance policy against any kind of action which can lead to physical harm to animals.”

How does India treat its wild animals?

Be it in zoos or national parks, harassment of wild animals has become all too common. In tiger reserves, tourists often pressure drivers to flout rules.

In yet another video posted recently, tourists stop a safari jeep to get closer to the tiger. However, the big cat was not pleased and growled and charged toward the vehicle. At this point, the jeep driver hurriedly moved the car forward. The tiger did not hurt anyone, turned around and retreated to the jungle.

Indian Forest Officer Surrender Mehta, who shared the video, tweeted, “Sometimes, our ‘too much’ eagerness for ‘Tiger sighting’ is nothing but intrusion in their Life.”

While it remains unclear in which national park in India the video was shot, the internet is flooded with clips of close encounters with tigers.

In 2020, a vehicle driver and guide were suspended in Maharashtra’s Tadoba-Andhari Tiger Reserve (TATR) for blocking the path of a dominant male tiger. A year before that, a tourist and his guide were jointly fined Rs 51,000 for allegedly pelting stones at a sleeping tiger in Rajasthan’s Ranthambore Tiger Reserve (RTR) because they wanted to get a “perfect action shot”, according to a report in The Times of India.

Also read: Maya, Machli, Munna, naam toh suna hoga?: How India’s legendary tigers got their names

What do the rules say?

After the Tadoba incident, the National Tiger Conservation Authority (NTCA) directed chief wildlife wardens of all the states to follow protocol and maintain a 500-metre distance between two vehicles during a safari to allow for the passage of wild animals.

According to NTCA guidelines, each reserve is expcted to set a ceiling level on the number of visitors allowed to enter the park to prevent overcrowding. A list of dos and don’ts is a must. Safari vehicles are permitted only in the tourism zones of the forest and on designated tracks. Tourism is restricted to 20 per cent of the core areas of the reserves and a maximum of 40 cars per day are permitted.

NTCA member-secretary Anup Kumar Nayak told The Times of India that it has been observed that tourist vehicles inside reserves do not maintain the 500-metre distance resulting in overcrowding around animals.

How do tourists impact tigers?

According to a report in Mongabay, a study examining stress hormones in tiger scat collected from two popular central Indian tiger reserves – Bandhavgarh and Kanha – revealed that the carnivores suffer from high levels of physiological stress due to wildlife tourism and a large number of vehicles entering the parks.

“Chronically elevated glucocorticoid levels can negatively impact growth, reproductive success, immunity, and cause muscular atrophy,” senior author Govindhaswamy Umapathy, who is a principal scientist and project leader at the Laboratory for the Conservation of Endangered Species (LaCONES) at CSIR-Centre for Cellular and Molecular Biology (CCMB), Hyderabad told the publication. “If it continues it will have a definite impact on the population in the long-term.”

The tiger needs to be saved, sometimes from irresponsible tourists and sometimes from overzealous drivers and guides. In Satpura, it looks like it was the latter

With inputs from agencies

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