Forest Minister of Maharashtra Sudhir Mungantiwar, on Tuesday, asked Forest Department to use Artificial Intelligence (AI) based mitigation options to reduce man-animal conflict in Ramtek and Parseoni talukas. In last one year, both the talukas witnessed many incidents of man-animal conflict due to which many human lives were lost. In a recent incident, a tigress killed a tribal woman working in an agriculture field in Jhinjeria village of Deolapar range of Pench Tiger Reserve (PTR). In a separate incident, another tiger attacked a man in Parseoni taluka. The victim was lucky to have survived with some injuries.

 

Due to frequent attacks on humans, villagers were in panic in both talukas. Following the death of a tribal woman, angry villagers resorted to attack forest teams. Also, the irked agitators vandalised many forest vehicles. Since the incident, Deolapar village remains tense with a large number of villagers agitating for last three days. Taking cognisance of the sentiment of villagers and seriousness of the incident, Forest Minister Mungantiwar, during his visit to Nagpur on Tuesday, directed the forest officials to use technology to reduce man-animal conflict in the State. Mungantiwar also asked the forest officials to ensure chain-link fencing around the villages situated very close to the forest area to reduce incidents of wild animals venturing near human habitat and agriculture farms. Initially, the Forest Minister advised concerning department including Forest, Revenue, Tribal, and Police to implement the fencing on a one village. He also advised to translocate excess tigers from Pench to other places if the department find any big cat causing problem for the villagers.

 

He also give permission to capture tigers those are repeatedly killing villagers in Ramtek and Parsheoni talukas. He also directed to send such tigers to Gorewada Rescue Centre. The forest minister also asked forest department to form first response team at village level with the help of young villagers who can help the villagers at such man-animal conflict situations. Forest department will provide shock sticks, torch, and other essential equipment to such youth to avoid man-animal conflict in the region. While talking about adoption of AI, Mungantiwar said, “Forest department should think about utilisation of AI as early alert system to villagers at the situation of venturing of wild animals near forest. Department should take help of expertise of Indian Army and Police Department for adoption of such technology.” The meeting was attended by Adv Ashish Jaiswal, MLA; Shomita Biswas, PCCF (HoFF); Dr Vipin Itankar, district collector; Vinayak Mahamuni, Chief Executive Officer (CEO), Nagpur Zilla Parishad; Harsh Poddar, Superintendent of Police; Vivek Khandekar; Dr Prabhunath Shukla, Deputy Director, PTR; and D Mallikarjun Reddy, ex MLA.