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1. Roads Emerging as a Critical Threat to Leopards in India?
A leopard killed in vehicular collision on the outskirts of Bangalore, Karnataka
Deccan Herald
This article originally appeared in Cat News 60 – Spring 2014 issue.
Leopards (Panthera pardus) face severe threats from poaching, loss of habitat and killing in
retaliation to conflict. However, in India a new threat appears to be emerging in the form of
vehicle accident mortalities. In the past 60 months 23 leopards have been recorded as killed
due to road accidents in the southern Indian state of Karnataka alone. When roads overlap
with important wildlife habitats, considerable scrutiny and critical conservation planning is
urgently required.
Leopards are one of the widely distributed wild cats in the world with nine subspecies found
in varied habitats across its entire range. Loss of habitat, poaching and retaliatory killing are
recognized as the key threats to leopards in its entire range. The species is currently
categorized as Near Threatened on the IUCN Red List with some subspecies identified as
Critically Endangered (Henschel et al. 2008, IUCN 2013).
India hosts substantial leopard numbers though there are no nationwide estimates available.
In India, leopards survive in protected areas (PAs), multiple use forests (legally termed as
reserved forests) and even in highly human dominated landscapes. The threats within India
are similar as in other parts of the leopards’ range.
India’s phenomenal economic growth (~8%) over the last two decades was based on an
expansion of physical infrastructure such as roads, railway, power and communication
networks for improved commerce. Roads, some of which pass through ecologically important
sites, constitute a threat resulting not only in habitat fragmentation but also in direct
mortalities of wildlife due to collisions with vehicles. In India, the challenge comes primarily
from the conversion of existing small roads with low-volume traffic into high-speed
highways, while a few new roads also opening up remote locations (Gubbi et al. 2012). In
addition, there has been a rapid growth of motor vehicles at 10.5% during 2002-2012
(MoSRTH 2012).