Recently, the Supreme Court asked if a ‘Project Great Indian Bustard (GIB)’, on the lines of ‘Project Tiger’, could be launched. Project Tiger, launched by India’s environment ministry in 1973, is touted as a huge success.
- The apex court was hearing a plea to protect the endangered bird Great Indian Bustard (GIB).
About Great Indian Bustard
- Great Indian Bustard is found mainly in Rajasthan and Gujarat.
- The bird has been categorised as critically endangered in the red list by the International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN).
- GIBs prefer grasslands as their habitats.
- GIBs are considered the flagship bird species of grassland and hence barometers of the health of grassland ecosystems.
- Among the biggest threats to the GIBs are overhead power transmission lines. Due to their poor frontal vision, the birds can’t spot the power lines from a distance, and are too heavy to change course when close. Thus, they collide with the cables and die.
- Loss of habitat because of agricultural expansion, infrastructure development and hunting has seen a sharp decline in the population of the bustard. The birds are also occasionally poached outside protected areas. While hunting the GIB is banned in India, in Pakistan, it is killed for its flesh.
- The Supreme Court in April 2021 ordered that all overhead power transmission lines in core and potential GIB habitats in Rajasthan and Gujarat should be made underground.
- In 2015, the Centre had launched the GIB species recovery programme. Under this, the WII and Rajasthan forest department jointly set up breeding centres where GIB eggs harvested from the wild were incubated artificially.
