October 7, 2023

Thursday, 11:10 PM

Dholpur-Karauli Tiger Reserve

Dholpur, Rajasthan

We are currently in the Dholpur-Karauli Tiger Reserves, which came into being very recently in August 2023, raising the official count to 54, but there is another Tiger Reserve that has been even more recently notified as such — the Veerangana Durgavati Tiger Reserve in Madhya Pradesh. The Veerangana Durgavati Tiger Reserve was notified as a Tiger Reserve on September 20, 2023. but it had not found place on the official list of Tiger Reserves of the Tiger Reserves the National Tiger Conservation Authority (NTCA) when we announced ATR about two weeks ago on September 17, 2023. 

Now, while the Veerangana Durgavati Tiger Reserve of Madhya Pradesh is on NTCA’s list of Reserves, the Dholpur-Karauli Tiger Reserve of Rajasthan, which was declared a Tiger Reserve in August 2023 itself, is still missing from NTCA’s list. So when we said there were 54 Tiger Reserves in India, we had counted Dholpur-Karauli in, but not Durgavati because the latter had not been declared a Tiger Reserve then (ATR was announced on September 17, 2023; Durgavati was notified as a Reserve three days later on September 20, 2023). Therefore, as per the official list of the NTCA, there are 54 Tiger Reserves in India whereas there are actually 55, including the most-recent Dholpur-Karauli (August 2023) and Durgavati (September 2023) reserves. But it still beats me why Dholpur-Karauli has not been listed by the NTCA. 

Anyway, moving to today. The day was interesting in its own way, like most days are. And just as tiring because of all the video shooting, editing and uploading involved in keeping the daily VLOGs going on the go, which becomes particularly challenging in face of the abysmally slow Internet speed that we most get in and around forests. 

Today started a bit late because we all got up late and could manage to leave the hotel only by about noon. But the good thing was that the DFO of the region had arranged for our visit to the core area that is being prepared to be opened for safaris the next year as part of the newly designated Dholpur-Karauli Tiger Reserve (maybe the official name would be something else later). The counting of tigers is on, so the tracking of the tigers is in progress on war footing. We also met some of the villagers in the core zone, who are in the process of being relocated so that the core zone is free of human occupation, thereby reducing the animal-human conflict.

There are about five to ten tigers here, and we found fresh pugmarks and tiger trails not older than eight hours or so, which means that the tiger movement is pretty brisk here, and hopefully, when the Reserve opens for safari next year, it would be a roaring success. I sure wish and hope so.