12 August 2020.

Introduction:

National Portal on Human Elephant conflict called “Surakshya” has been launched by the Union Minister for Environment Prakash Javdekar.  The portal was launched on the ocassion of World Elephant Day, which is observed on 12th August.

Highlights:

• SURAKHSYA will manage the conflicts on a real-time basis.
• It will help to set the data collection protocols, data transmission pipelines, and data visualization tools to enable policy-makers to leverage HEC data for policy formulation and for preparation of Action Plans for mitigation of conflicts.  
• The beta version of the SURAKHSYA portal was launched for data testing before the pan India roll out for adoption by the states, which is likely to be done before the year-end.
• The move by the Government of India is aimed to save Elephants and other animals. GoI is currently taking measures towards robust, practical, and cost-effective solutions to end the Human-Animal Conflict.

IUCN Status of elephants:

• Endangered- in IUCN Red List.
• There are 50,000 to 60,000 Asian Elephants.
•  Out of these 60% are in India.
• Poaching and habitat loss are the primary reasons for their declining population.

Project Elephant:

·         Project Elephant (PE), is a centrally sponsored scheme and was launched in February 1992 to provide financial and technical support to major elephant bearing States in the country for protection of elephants, their habitats and corridors.

·          It also seeks to address the issues of human-elephant conflict and welfare of domesticated elephants.

·         The Project is being implemented in 13 States / UTs, viz. Andhra pradesh , Arunachal Pradesh, Assam, Jharkhand , Karnataka , Kerala , Meghalaya , Nagaland , Orissa , Tamil Nadu , Uttranchal , Uttar Pradesh and West Bengal.

Elephant Corridors:

• An Elephant Corridor is a narrow stretch of land that connects habitats with elephant population.
• There are 88 identified elephant corridors in India.
• 22 are in North –Eastern India, 14 in Northern West Bengal, 20 in South India,12 in  Northern –Western India and 20 in Central India.
• The major threats to elephant corridors are construction activities,poaching,mining and human elephant conflicts.