BJP criticises Assam govt over Kaziranga National Park

"Chief Minister Tarun Gogoi and Forest Minister Rockybul Hussain have hatched a big conspiracy to free the park so that illegal migrants could be settled to increase the Congress vote bank", party MP Rajen Gohain told reporters here.

The Congress party, particularly Hussain, was trying to evict indigenous people from the buffer zone of the park to allow the migrants to encroach on the forest areas, Gohain alleged.

The government has declared a tiger zone inside the park. But there are 185 villages housing indigenous people in the core area who have to be removed as nobody is allowed to reside in a forest core zone, he said.

"But significantly the government has declared buffer zone for the tiger project where illegal migrants have encroached thereby allowing them to stay on", Gohain said.

More than 22 animals, including nine highly endangered one horned rhinos, have perished either in the floods or at the hands of poachers since last week when the third wave of floods started.