ANATARA BOSE
Jamshedpur, Sept 3: The Tata Steel Zoological park on Saturday organised a programme during the International Vulture Awareness Day for school and college students where facts and figures on vultures were shared for them to understand the present scenario. Head of Biodiversity, Tata Steel, Hishmi Jamil Hussain; Principal of Jamshedpur Cooperative College Amar Singh; the director of Tata Steel Zoological park Bipul Chakrabarty and curator of the zoo Sanjay Mahato were present on the awareness programme.
The International Vulture Awareness Day, observed on the first Saturday of September, raises awareness to save this endangered species from getting extinct.
Students of Kerala Samajam Model School and undergraduate and postgraduate zoology students of the Jamshedpur Cooperative College were invited to the awareness programme on Saturday.
“About 30 years ago, vultures were commonly spotted even in urban spaces but no more. They are known as the natural scavengers and feasted on livestock carcasses, but it doesn’t happen anymore. Thus the programme was to spread awareness and to discuss how we can protect the species,” said the director of Tata Steel Zoological Park, Bipul Chakrabarty.
According to a 2015 report by Hazaribagh-based wildlife biologist Satya Prakash, the Gyps vultures, one of the most common varieties of vultures, has witnessed a decline of 97 per cent in the past many years. Gyps vultures are one of the nine vulture species in the Indian sub-continent. In the world, there are about 22 species of vultures.
Over the years, the reason for their severe decline has been lack of the availability of food i.e livestock and also a non-steroidal anti-inflammatory drug called Diclofenac that was given to cattle.
Experts and various reports suggest that the drug has been the primary reason for the decline of the vulture population causing renal failure in the birds.
Mahato presented the vulture availability in Jharkhand sharing the details. About 120 college and school students also participated in an informal quiz while Hussain spoke about vulture safe zones with reference to Bundelkhand. Principal of the Jamshedpur Cooperative College Amar Singh discussed the breeding and conservation programmes that may be possible in future.
