15 camera traps to keep eye on movement of leopards in Aravali

GURGAON: In the view of increasing rumours about leopard sightings in certain areas close to Aravali Hills in Gurgaon, the forest department has installed 15 camera traps in forest areas close to urban habitat to monitor the movement of the wild cats. Camera traps were installed in areas like Ghata, Wazirabad, Chakkarpur and Haiderpur Viran by the forest department with the help of Wildlife Institute of India (WII) on Saturday and Sunday.
Till now only two camera traps were installed in forest area of Bandhwari and Mangar, which had captured a full-grown leopard in September. Following numerous rumours of leopard sightings from the areas like sector 51, 57 and Sushant Lok-I. “Aravalli has good number of wild animals including leopards, so after recent rumours about leopard sightings in urban areas the department has decided to increase the number of camera traps and installed in areas particularly close to urban habitats,” said conservator of forest (Gurgaon circle) MD Sinha. He said with the help of the camera traps they will able to track the movement of leopard and keep a continuous eye on the wild animals. “This will help in conservation and protection of wild animals and their habitat,” said Sinha adding that along with this they are also planning to fence these areas.
He clarified that fencing is not sufficient to restrict the movement of leopard, but it will keep pray of leopard inside the forest. He said fencing will also help in checking disturbance of forest areas. “If leopard comes out of forest areas then they will pray on dogs, their favourate food, available in urban areas. If they get used to it then it will create some problem,” said Sinha adding that to avoid this, efforts will have to be taken to stop human disturbance in core forest areas like Bandhwari and Manger to check migration of leopard to urban areas. He said 30 km long liner forest patch from Bandhwari to Damdama which covers more than 5000 hectares of forest acts as wildlife corridor between Asola Bhatti in Delhi to Sariska Tiger Reserve in Rajasthan. “In last two years several leopard and cubs had died in the region, which proves that area is highly disturbed and there is need to minimise the human interference for conservation and protection of wildlife,” said Sinha adding that the area has good pray base to host wildcat.
“This is the last patch of forest in Delhi NCR which needs to be protected at any cost. Any destruction to this area will lead to extinction of leopard and wildlife from the region,” said Sinha adding that corporate companies, which have presence in the region, should come forward as part of their corporate social responsibility to contribute towards conservation and protection of wildlife. Stressing on the importance of Aravali, environmentalist Amina Shervani said, “Area is a single patch of hills that is the last remaining large scale wildlife habitat for and criss-crossed by all kinds of animals including Leopard, Striped Hyena, Indian Golden Jackal, Ruddy Mongoose ,Small Indian Civet and Common Palm Civet, Mongoose, Neelgai etc.” She said this clearly indicate that there is considerable wildlife presence in the Aravali hills to the east and south of Asola Bhatti Sanctuary in Haryana and these hills are both habitat and wildlife corridor and act as an important buffer to the Asola Sanctuary.