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Deer translocation issue referred to Wildlife Institute of India: Delhi govt to HC | Delhi News
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The Delhi High Court was informed on Monday that the issue of the translocation of spotted deer from the capital’s deer park to forest areas in the city as well as Rajasthan had been referred to the Wildlife Institute of India, Dehradun.
Delhi government counsel Satyakam made the submission before a bench of Chief Justice Satish Chandra Sharma and Justice Tushar Rao Gedela after a plea was filed alleging that guidelines laid down by the Central Zoo Authority (CZA) and the International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN) for translocating animals were not being complied with.
The bench granted time to the respondents, including Delhi government’s chief wildlife warden, to file their responses in the matter. The plea has been listed for hearing next on January 15, 2024.
The plea claims that on June 8, the CZA’s technical committee approved translocation of 600 deer from the A N Jha Deer Park to a forest in Rajasthan and the Asola sanctuary in Delhi in the ratio of 70:30. This was subject to the condition that the release shall comply with the statutory provisions and the IUCN guidelines for reintroductions and other conservation translocations.
The plea claims that none of the guidelines were being complied with and no prior health check was conducted to ascertain if the deer were pregnant or not and that even young deer were being loaded onto trucks for translocation.
In the same June 8 order, the CZA cancelled the A N Jha Deer Park’s recognition as a “mini-zoo”. The deer park falls under the Delhi Development Authority’s jurisdiction.
The plea asks for directions to be issued to the respondents to not translocate pregnant deer, young ones and antlered animals. The deer that cannot be translocated should be allowed to remain within the deer park and the park should not be closed, it has further said.
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The plea refers to an evaluation report of the deer park from September 2022, which was done on the CZA’s directions. As per the report, the enclosure is designed to house up to 60 animals and it was overcrowded with 530 animals back then.
The plea states that the chief wildlife warden had sought translocation of the deer to the Asola forest owing to an increase in the population of leopards there and to “supplement the prey base”.
The plea submits that the deer have spent a sheltered life in captivity and translocation would leave them with a “scant chance” to escape a predator attack and that they would die in no time.
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