I don’t know whether how many of us have read “Life of Pie”. It’s a wonderful story depicting the life of Mr. Patel where he scores high for elucidating the zoo-life: how animals feel, what they want and what freedom is meant for them. Somewhere in the book he says, “In many ways, running a zoo is a hotelkeeper’s worst nightmare. Consider: the guests never leave their rooms; they expect not only lodging but full board…Each guest is very particular about his or her diet.” Now Mr. Jairam Ramesh is only concerned over the tiger reserves and he is right in many ways. Think of a tiger reserve which is banned from tourism and the authority is running out of stock in all ways: fooding, lodging and money (funds). When the foreign visitors come to see these national parks, they spend quite a lot of pounds or dollars to experience such beauty. Thus the revenues earned from these tourists are undoubtedly worthwhile. It’s very much true that there are very few (only 1411) tigers left in India. But will not that be a little jerky to insist on ban on tourists only to increase the number of tigers? After so many altercations regarding the widening of the road from Nagpur to Jabalpur through Pench reserve forest, from 18 mtrs to 30 mtrs, it was even a dilemma of the bench: to save tiger or to save money. Here the main dispute was whether widening a road was really going to cause harm to the natives of the forests or not. Banning tourists from entering the reserves is really a foolish idea. However, so long as the ‘save tiger project’ is concerned, it is nothing to do with the tourism; because all what tourists want is a fresh glimpse of the flesh eating giants running through the greens and not to put their lives at stake. Considering the monetary aspect, the oppositions should be ready to find an alternative way to arrange for the same amount of maintenance fund to be provided to the national parks if they become void of the nature lovers.
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