WILL THE BIG CAT GET ARMY PROTECTION?

New Delhi, June 26: General Joginder Jaswant Singh has proposed to the Prime Minister a series of measures for the conservation of the tiger and other wildlife in a move that adds new dimensions to both the army chief’s personality and to the army’s job profile.

To his personality ? one of the stiff bearing and the sharpshooter ? the general, who is called “Tiger” by many of his friends and colleagues, will add the dimension of the committed conservationist. And this has interesting possibilities.

It is amusing to wonder what new meaning can be read into William Blake’s ode to the Royal of the jungles:

Tiger, tiger, burning bright,
In the forests of the night
What immortal hand or eye
Could frame thy fearful symmetry

This comes at a time when the army’s image has been a little mauled by the furore over soldier suicides after Lieutenant Susmita Chakraborthy shot herself.

For the army, the general’s presentation, made at a meeting on Monday that was chaired by Prime Minister Manmohan Singh, means that the force will have to shoulder a new responsibility for environment protection and wildlife conservation.

The army has proposed that its brigadiers may be inducted into state wildlife boards. In Jammu and Kashmir, where the army is heavily deployed, some of its officers have been made honorary wildlife wardens.

It has also proposed that its formation commanders down to the brigade level in sensitive zones be empowered to deal with poachers. For this, the Wildlife Protection Act will have to be amended.

“The army has said that it can involve itself wherever they are deployed, in and around their establishments, and also that senior officers should be given legal powers,” said Ravi Singh, chief executive officer of the Worldwide Fund For Nature ? India who also attended the meeting.

As an experiment, the army has offered to adopt one wildlife sanctuary. The proposals have been inspired by its conservation activity in Jammu and Kashmir and in the Northeast.

In Jammu and Kashmir where years of strife had led to the dwindling of the Hangul, a red Kashmiri deer of the Dachigam reserve, there is evidence that their number is now increasing.

Also in the Pir Panjal ranges, near Poonch, the army has been engaged with environmentalists in a survey of the Markhor mountain goat.

The army chief’s proposals have been influenced by studies by a retired general. Major General Eustace D’Souza headed the Worldwide Fund For Nature ? India after leaving the service and has been a long-time advocate of the military’s involvement in environment protection.

The army chief has proposed that ex-servicemen and ecological battalions of the Territorial Army be involved in each state where their assistance will be useful.