Uttar Pradesh is setting up four modern rescue centres in Meerut, Pilibhit, Maharajganj and Chitrakoot to house large carnivores, such as leopards and tigers, captured frequently, to assuage public anger over instances of human-animal conflict, as well as to assure them of safety.

One of the hotspots in this conflict are Bijnor’s sugarcane fields, where leopard attacks and retaliatory killings have been mounting for the past seven years. Since 2023, more than 30 people have died of leopard attacks in the district, and over 100 leopards captured.

Bijnor borders Uttarakhand’s famed tiger forests, which jut into Uttar Pradesh like extended fingers, and is at the heart of a thriving sugar industry. With stalks growing over 4-ft tall and harvested biennially, the sugarcane fields are an ideal habitat for the big cats – resembling the grasslands of old.

While Bijnor’s sugarcane fields are known to have always harboured wild cats, the rise in man-animal conflicts is recent. The first inkling of a shift came in 2019, which saw 15 recorded attacks, of which five were fatal. In 2023, there were 35 attacks and 19 human deaths, indicating a crisis.

Geographically, too, the conflict has expanded. Between 2015-2019 and 2020-2022, the number of conflict-affected villages in the district more than doubled from 72 to 155. Since 2023, that number has gone up to over 320 villages.

2013: After a decade-long policy logjam, the Uttarakhand government started shifting the settlements of Gujjar herders out of Corbett tiger reserve’s Kalagarh division. By 2014-15, 157 families were relocated.

In the four years following 2013, tiger numbers in Corbett’s Kalagarh division increased from 71 to 109 – a 54% spike, attributed by experts to the relocation of human settlements.

2016: Six weeks before the Assembly elections were announced in January 2017, the then Akhilesh Yadav government in Uttar Pradesh hiked the state advisory price (SAP) for sugarcane by Rs 25 per quintal to Rs 305 – an unprecedented 9% jump.

👁 Bijnor

Post the hike in SAP, area under sugarcane in Bijnor district jumped from 2.05 lakh in 2016 to 2.35 lakh hectares four years later – a significant boost, considering the acreage remained mostly static since the turn of the century. Bijnor now has 2.58 lakh hectares under sugarcane – a 26% increase in less than a decade.

2017-20: Soon after assuming office in 2017, the BJP-led government under Yogi Adityanath imposed a de facto ban on cow slaughter. His government started building gaushalas (cow shelters) across the state and strengthened the 1955 Act on cow slaughter through an ordinance in 2020.

From six in 2017, the number of gaushalas in Bijnor district by 2023 was 47. Their number has since jumped to 83 – 74 of those run by the government.

Multiple studies suggest that as they grow in numbers, tigers tend to dominate forest habitats, edging the leopards out. In Uttarakhand’s Rajaji National Park, for example, a 2011 study noted a four-fold drop in leopard density as the tiger density increased by 75%.

Dr Bivash Pandav, scientist with the Wildlife Institute of India and one of the authors of the 2011 Rajaji study, pointed out a similar consequence of relocating the Gujjar herders from Corbett’s Kalagarh forest division. “The resurgence in Kalagarh’s tiger population must certainly have pushed the leopards either north towards the hills or south towards the plains of Uttar Pradesh or both,” Dr Pandav said.

A detailed report by researchers from Aligarh Muslim University backs his point. As leopards moved southward from Corbett to Bijnor, areas along the district’s northern boundary started showing up on the conflict map.

In the plains, while the newly-arrived leopards were adapting to the ways of the sugarcane landscape, a rapid expansion of sugarcane farming allowed them to occupy new areas, where not every villager was familiar with ways to keep peace with the big cat.

Sanjay Kumar Pathak, former chief conservator of UP’s Dudhwa Tiger Reserve who was dispatched to Bijnor for firefighting at the height of conflict in 2023-24, underlines the importance of the traditional wisdom gained over generations by sugarcane farmers.

“During my years in Lakhimpur-Kheri district, I saw how farmers respect the animal, avoid sensitive areas during sunrise or sunset and so on. But those not used to sharing space with leopards are not as careful. The young also lack patience. When you want to utilise every corner of land and bring sugarcane fields to your backyard, you have to take every precaution,” Pathak said.

The coexistence with leopards was further tested in 2023 due to sudden availability of dumped cattle carcasses in many parts of the district. While no one speaks on record about this, the general agreement is that the state’s ban on cow slaughter was behind a surge in open disposal of carcasses.

“Be it a bull or a dry cow, nobody feeds an unproductive animal. Sold to a slaughterhouse, every bit of a carcass would be of some use. Without that option, abandoned cattle end up at gaushalas, which are not equipped to properly handle so many animals,” a panchayat functionary and resident of Bijnor’s Dhampur tehsil said.

Back in January 2019, the Adityanath government came up with an advisory that prescribed “proper disposal of cattle carcass through incineration”. However, said Dr Lokesh Agarwal, Bijnor’s chief veterinary officer, the district, like other rural belts, has no incinerator for cattle disposal. “So we follow the deep burial method,” he said, while denying any information on carcass dumping.

Local residents, however, said there were multiple sites where cattle carcasses were dumped, inviting feral dogs, and leopards. “Most conflict hotspots have such carcass dumpyards. Recently, even a tiger was spotted eating dead cattle,” said a retired forest officer.

There are perils to wild cats getting habituated to assisted feeding as well. “It can make leopards lose their natural inhibition and be less fearful about approaching people or their homesteads. An assured supply of food also boosts breeding and increases the local density of leopards artificially,” said wildlife biologist Dr Sanjay Gubbi.

Bijnor’s Divisional Forest Officer Gyan Singh, who suggests measures such as keeping a close watch on children, avoiding fields at night, playing music to announce one’s presence, being watchful when hunched down in the field etc, to prevent leopard attacks, said the cases have been coming down.

“We have formed rapid response teams and shored up our capacity for rescuing leopards. We now have more than 100 trap cages in Bijnor,” he said. At least 50 sugarcane leopards have been translocated to the district’s forested areas since 2023, he added.

However, experts point out that capturing and releasing animals elsewhere do not reduce conflict. Like all animals, a displaced leopard invariably tries to return to its home range, walking through unfamiliar territories, fuelling more conflict. And very few animals deserve lifelong captivity – the other conflict management option fast gaining currency.

“Neither our laws nor the science permit capturing wildlife and keeping them confined for life unless an animal is injured or has become a habitual attacker on people. Sending a settled animal to a zoo merely due to perceived conflict opens up that space for a new animal, which can potentially create real conflict,” cautioned Dr Rajesh Gopal, former chief, the NTCA and Project Tiger.