A rapid response unit vehicle. Telegraph picture

Valmiki Tiger Reserve would soon have a rapid response unit vehicle to rescue animals during incidents of man-beast conflicts.

Wildlife Conservation Trust would donate the vehicle to the reserve. The tailor-made vehicle would be equipped with necessary items needed to rescue or capture a strayed animal for its rehabilitation in the wild. The vehicle also has a specially designed platform atop it sitting on which the rescue team can dart the strayed animal to tranquilise it.

“It is a specially designed sports utility vehicle, which can move in difficult terrain and has all facilities like a small generator, tent, blowpipe to use tranquilisers, megaphone, searchlights, stretcher and more to capture a stray animal and handle villagers who generally panic in such situations leading to chances of confrontation,” said R.K. Singh, the head of training wing of Wildlife Conservation Trust.

Singh has played a major role in getting this vehicle donated to the reserve. He said the trust has so far donated 44 such vehicles to different forest reserves of the country and the organisation had signed a memorandum of understanding with the state government to provide aid worth Rs 50 lakh during the course of three years for effective management of forest and wildlife resources in Bihar.

The vehicle would be handed over to the government in a special function on October 5 to mark the day when a formal announcement to declare the Gangetic dolphin a national aquatic animal was made by Prime Minister Manmohan Singh three years back.

Bihar chief wildlife warder B.A. Khan said: “Instead of mobilising resources after getting news of a strayed animal to capture it, we would have a ready-to-use vehicle at our disposal, which can be sent to the field with a team to carry out the rescue operation.”

Wildlife expert and the manager of Wildlife Trust of India, Samir Kumar Sinha, who has been carrying out research work in VTR for the past 10 years, however, had a different opinion. “The vehicle would be a utility tool in rescuing strayed animals. But more than that, planning and support of the local administration matter more in such situations,” he said.