Number of elephants in Uttar Pradesh increased to 352 from 232 in three years: Census

The number of elephants in Uttar Pradesh has increased in the past three years. Elephant census of 2020 has counted 352 elephants in 2020 whereas the in 2017 number was 232. The counting process was conducted from June 6 to June 8 in Dudhwa Tiger Reserve, Amangarh Tiger Reserve, Shivalik forest division (Saharanpur) and Bijnor forest division (Najibabad).

Census conducted in collaboration with Uttarakhand

The census was based on 'Ocular method'. It was conducted from 6 am till 11 am and 3 pm to 7 pm on three days mentioned. 149 elephants were counted in Dudhwa Tiger Reserve, 82 in Amangarh Tiger Reserve, 103 in Bijnor forest division and 18 in Shivalik forest division. 

Several incidents of elephant-human conflicts have been reported in the past few days. In Chhattisgarh, six elephants have died in four districts in the last 12 days.

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Maharashtra reserves forest for elephants

Meanwhile, the Maharashtra government on Tuesday notified almost 3,000 hectares of forest land as a reserve for elephants who had wandered into Sindhudurg district from neighbouring Karnataka almost two decades ago.

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Samadhan Chavan, Deputy Conservator of Forests of Sawantwadi in Sindhudurg, told PTI it was the first time that a forest has been reserved for elephants in the state. The notification said 2,953.38 hectares of forest land in Sindhudurg would be a "reserved forest" for "conservation of tiger, elephant and leopard".

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"This is a huge step as nowhere in Maharashtra a forest or any other area was reserved for elephants till now," Chavan said.

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