India is home to four of the eight species of bears -- Himalayan brown bear, Asiatic black bear, Sloth bear and Sun bear.
"Bears in India are threatened due to poaching for their body parts, retaliatory killings to reduce conflicts and habitat loss due to degradation and fragmentation," says Wildlife Institute of India, an autonomous institution of the Ministry of Environment and Forests.
In addition to these concerns, the rehabilitation of communities that eke out a living on tame bears has made their conservation a challenge, it says.
Wildlife Trust of India (WTI), a non-profit organisation, says a bear bile (gland) was seized recently in Uttarakhand, highlighting persistent threats to bears worldwide.
The seizure took place in a remote village near Gobind Wildlife Sanctuary, in a joint operation by the Uttarakhand forest department assisted by the WTI.
Bordering Nepal, which is a common smuggling route for illegal wildlife trade to China, Uttarakhand has long battled poaching and wildlife crime.
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