Oscar winning Hollywood actor and a vocal environmentalist Leonardo DiCaprio has praised the Assam Government for its efforts which resulted in zero poaching of one-horned rhinoceros in the state in 2022.
The state government on January 1 announced that for the first time since 1977, there was no poaching of the endangered animal in the state in 2022. This was praised by Prime Minister Narendra Modi and many other global environmentalists.
DiCaprio, in an Instagram post on Thursday, said, “In 2021, the government of the Indian state of Assam set out to end the poaching of the Endangered Greater One-Horned Rhinoceros in Kaziranga National Park following the killing of around 190 animals for their horns between 2000 and 2021. In 2022, they met their goal and no rhinos were poached in the area for the first time since 1977.”
“Kaziranga National Park is home to 2,200 Greater One-horned Rhinos, which is about two-thirds of the world’s population. This triumph in India also comes with more good news, as @wwf (World Wildlife Fund) also reports that the world population of the rare rhino soared to around 3,700 from about 200 at the turn of the 20th century,” he added.
In order to control the poaching, the Assam government formed a special Anti-Poaching Task Force in July, 2021. In that year, the poaching came to the lowest in 21 years with only one case reported.
Chief minister Himanta Biswa Sarma in 2021 said there are myths amongst some sections which lead the killing of Rhinoceros. To break that, he burnt 2,500 rhino horns in September that year. The horns were recovered and preserved by the government for the past four decades.
According to the director general of the Assam police, Gyanendra Pratap Singh, the highest number of poaching in the state was registered in 2013 and 2014, with 27 cases each year. It reduced to 17 in 2015 and it was 18 in 2016. The cases dropped to 6 in 2017 and it was 7 in 2018. From 2019, the cases dropped continuously with 3 cases in 2019, 2 cases in 2020 and 1 in 2021.