The Sunderbans will become the second largest tiger reserve among the 55 such sanctuaries in the country as the National Tiger Conservation Authority (NTCA) has given the technical clearance to include 1,100sqkm of forests in South 24-Parganas to the existing buffer zone.

The formal announcement now needs a go-ahead from the Prime Minister-chaired National Board of Wildlife (NBWL) but it is only a formality. According to forest department sources, the Sunderbans is currently the seventh-largest tiger reserve in India.

Spread over 2,585.89sqkm, the Sunderbans Tiger Reserve (STR), will now expand to 3,629.57sqkm once the three forest ranges in South 24-Parganas — Raidighi, Matla and Ramganga — are added to it.

It will be barely 100sqkm smaller than the Nagarjunasagar Srisailam Tiger Reserve in Andhra Pradesh, the country’s largest tiger reserve, spread over 3,727.82sqkm, according to Bengal forest department sources.

“The same (expansion of the Sunderbans) has already been given a technical nod from the NTCA,” G.S. Bhardwaj, the member secretary of the NTCA, told
The Telegraph.

The NTCA, led by minister Bhupender Yadav, is a statutory body under the ministry of environment, forest and climate change which takes technical decisions regarding tiger conservation.

The NTCA’s clearance has been given based on the Bengal government’s proposal to include the entire area of the three forest ranges into the STR, a step, the forest department believes, will improve the management of tigers in the areas and also attract more central funding for
the Sunderbans.

“We expect the clearance to be accorded any time soon, maybe in the next NBWL meeting, as the proposal has been with the ministry for nearly seven months,” said a senior official with the state forest department. No meeting of the board has been held since February because of the general election.

“I have been pushing it for more than a decade, and happy that the proposal is expected to be finalised soon. As the NTCA has cleared the proposal, and the increase in the tiger reserve area is under consideration, not the opposite, permission from the board is highly likely,” said Soumitra Dasgupta, a retired forester and former head of the forest force in Bengal who had been in key positions in the ministry.

Biswajit Roy Choudhury, an expert on big cats and a member of the state wildlife board, said: “According to the 2023 census, the STR has around 80 tigers while the South 24-Parganas forest areas, outside the STR, have around 21 tigers within the total estimated number of 101 tigers in the Sunderbans.

“We expect that the number of tigers may increase with better management, as the tiger-reserve tag will help in filling the vacant posts and better patrolling of the
forest area.”

The small fishermen’s association, however, is apprehensive that such a tag will impact the livelihoods of around 50,000 folks in the area.

“Already, the fishermen in the present STR face a lot of trouble. Once the three ranges are added to the STR, the livelihood of thousands of fishermen, additionally, are expected to be impacted. There has been no discussion with the community before taking such a step that directly affects their livelihoods. We oppose it fully,” said Milan Das, the general secretary of Dakhin Banga Motsojibi Forum, a platform for small fishermen.