A wild homecoming for orphan cubs

Every morning, the cuddly, black bear cubs go inside the wild to spend the rest of the day playing with each other, searching for easy foods like fruits and learning difficult tricks like licking out ants from its mounds.

But "babies' day out" is different for these five cubs: they are constantly monitored by two keepers from a distance and return to enclosure at sunset.

The keepers keep their human identities secret by dressing in black gowns complete with hoods. This is done to prevent the cubs from getting attached to them, and help the animals live an unprotected, independent life once they are released in the wild.

The deep, dark jungles of Khari Pong in Arunachal Pradesh will soon become their permanent home and the five orphan bears will no longer come back to any enclosure.

Two bears have already been released in the forest. They were born free, are living free and hopefully will remain forever free due to an initiative taken by the Wildlife Trust of India (WTI).

Besides bears, six elephants, two rhinos and two wild buffaloes are in various stages of going back to the jungles. When found, these animals were on the verge of death and their parents had been killed by poachers.

A one-and-a-half-year-old rhino ventured out of the Kaziranga National Park with her mother when the rising Brahmaputra threatened to drown them. Poachers killed the mother in a tea estate, but the little rhino managed to escape. The female rhino calf was found hiding in tea bushes. She was rescued and now is safe.

The WTI has set up the Centre for Wildlife Rehabilitation and Conservation (CWRC) to hand-raise orphan animal calves and then relocate them in the wild for the rest of their lives. "This is the most comprehensive and one-of-its-kind programme in India," said Bipul Chakraborty, manager, WTI.

It reaps a two-way benefit, both for animals and the national parks. Manas, a world heritage site, is becoming the biggest beneficiary of this life-saving endeavour.

Located on the Assam-Bhutan border, Manas once boasted of a 100-plus rhino population. During the time of Bodo agitation, a volatile political situation gave poachers an easy access to the region and as a result, rhinos were wiped out.

Now three young rhinos, all rescued from the floods in Kaziranga and relocated to the region this February, have rekindled the hopes of the forest conservationists. "It is the first instance of a hand-raised rhino calf being returned to the wild in India," says Chakraborty.

Rhinos and elephants are send to Manas and the buffaloes are put inside the Dibru Saikhowa Wild Life Sanctuary. The rehab programme has different stages: Starting with rescuing, stabilising the calf in captivity, hand-raising them, managing them at stockades of rehab centre for almost two years, radio-collaring and disease screening after chemical restraint, building a natural enclosure or "boma" for later release, crating and translocation to release site, acclimatisation in boma for another two years, and finally releasing them in the wild and monitoring.

However, it's a costly affair. The annual budget for rhinos alone ranges between Rs 14,35,000 and Rs 20,50,000 and the transportation costs Rs 2,87,000 while creating an enclosure involves Rs 4,10,000.

The WTI had its share of setbacks too. The Maoists killed one of the five sloth bear cubs rescued from the Kalandar Community and released in the Bhimbandh Sanctuary. The Maoists threatened the WTI to stop its activities in the region.

"In order to monitor the movement of the released animals, the WTI attaches a radio collar to the bodies of the animals," said NVK Ashraf, director, WTI rescue programme.

In future, many animals will be rescued and brought to the CWRC to be reintroduced to the life in the wild.

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