Drones in Kaziranga National Park

Why in news?
=>Assam’s Kaziranga National Park (KNP), famous for its one-horned rhinos, is all set to boost maintenance and vigilance with a new set of hi-tech drones for capturing video footage of parts of the jungle not accessible on foot.
=>The government is also setting up a new division to ensure an increase in officials and forces patrolling the area to check poaching.

Bifurcation:
=>The KNP has also been bifurcated into two divisions: Eastern Assam Wildlife Division, the existing division that includes KNP and the new Biswanath Wildlife Division, with an area of about 401 sq km.
=>The new division will mean an increase in staff and vigilance in the area which will be very effective in preventing poaching and improving wildlife management.

‘e-surveillance’:
=>The Kaziranga National Park has already placed an Electronic surveillance, also called as ‘e-surveillance’ with eight towers within 20 km area around the park.
=>The feature of these towers is that they have thermal, infrared cameras which would immediately alert the forest staff if any kind of moving objects is captured by them. This, in turn, would help the forest staff to take immediate action.

Drones:
=>The first attempt to use drones in Kaziranga was in 2013, a trial run was also done. But the project for starting aerial surveying and monitoring received the Centre’s green signal only in early 2017.
=>The Park have three drones now: one with forest personnel and two with police. They are “helpful”, including during last year’s massive floods, but face limitations as they flew at a stretch for only 25-30 minutes and were not customised for wildlife usage.
The new drones are expected to be able to fly for 4-5 hours and take high quality footage. The new drones will overcome the time and maximum height limitation that the earlier ones had.

Poaching:
=>According to the latest count, KNP has 2,413 one-horned rhinos and in 2018, so far, at least five have fallen to poachers. Over the last two years incidents of poaching have gone down. As the crackdown on poachers continues in the state, at least 15 are behind bars.
=>The poaching crackdown in Kaziranga had come under scrutiny in April 2017 when the central government prohibited the BBC from filming in national parks and wildlife sanctuaries for “irreparable damage done to India’s reputation”.
=>The BBC had earlier been issued a notice for “grossly erroneous” reporting in a documentary that purportedly highlighted the government’s “ruthless anti-poaching strategy” for the Kaziranga tiger reserve.

Background:
=>Formed in 1908 on the recommendation of Mary Curzon, the park is located in the edge of the Eastern Himalayan biodiversity hotspots – Golaghat and Nagaon district. In the year 1985, the park was declared as a World Heritage Site by UNESCO.
=>Along with the iconic Greater one-horned rhinoceros, the park is the breeding ground of elephants, wild water buffalo, and swamp deer.
=>Over the time, the tiger population has also increased in Kaziranga, and that’s the reason why Kaziranga was declared as Tiger Reserve in 2006.
=>Also, the park is recognized as an Important Bird Area by BirdLife International for the conservation of avifaunal species.
=>Birds like lesser white-fronted goose, ferruginous duck, Baer’s pochard duck and lesser adjutant, greater adjutant, black-necked stork, and Asian Openbill stork specially migrate from the Central Asia during the winter season.

Pic courtesy:Kaziranga National Park