IWMB Recovers Dead Leopard At Trail 6

ISLAMABAD, (UrduPoint / Pakistan Point News - 20th Jan, 2019 ) :The Islamabad Wildlife Management Board (IWMB) has recovered the body of a male leopard that died of a bullet wound, from the top Bhudoban point of Trail 6 in Margalla Hills National Park (MHNP).

According to IWMB Assistant Director Sakhawat Ali, the dead wildcat was found by a ranger while patrolling in the National Park on January 12. Its autopsy, which was carried out on Monday (January 14), revealed that it was fired at by a 12-bore caliber AAA cartridge by some unknown suspects, he said while talking to APP.

He said investigation was underway to arrest the culprits while a First Investigation Report (FIR) would also be lodged to expedite the process.

The IWMB official said the board with the technical assistance of World Wildlife Fund (WWF)- Pakistan was working to implement the latest site patrolling and monitoring mechanism which was helpful in curbing illegal hunting and trespassing of the National Park to catch unique species of wildlife (poaching) for trade purposes.

He said the IWMB lacked of funds and proper gears for implementing the Spatial Monitoring and Reporting Tool (SMART) application to stop poaching and illegal wildlife trade in the country.

The SMART, he said, was cyber technology consisting of a software application that enables one to collect, store, communicate, and evaluate ranger-based data on patrol efforts, patrol results and threat levels.

Sakhawat Ali said the software was not working on the mobile phones of every staff member, including rangers conducting patrolling in the Margalla National Park, which had resulted in malfunctioning. The issue had been reported to World Wildlife Department, which was providing technical assistance to IWMB for implementing the software, he added.

He said the SMART patrolling system helped monitor and conserve all wildlife species in Margalla National Park and other protected areas and snow leopard preservation in Gilgit-Baltistan.

He said the software was completely a modern technology based accessible both on android smart phones and personal computers having Global Positioning System (GPS), pictures and various other features that helped wildlife conservators and national park managers to handle patrolling and monitoring of vast areas under their control.

Sakhawat said training of the staff was underway to conduct transparent and observation based monitoring through the SMART software.

"A ranger patrolling in the field cannot dodge and feed false information in the software as our working is based on on-site observation as the fictitious facts can be easily countered in case of doing so," he added.

At present, he said, the IWMB was working on the conservation of barking dears and regulation of wild boars. The past year's data and various images of cameras installed at different locations of the National Park showed healthy number of barking deer to total 65, he added.

He said the surrounding area of Margalla Road was providing favourable conditions for wild boars moving in the sector as most of the trash trolleys, with food leftover dumped by the residents, were placed across it.

He said the IWMB was conducting a research on the violent behaviour of boars in the wake of an incident where the wild animal had entered a college of the Federal capital and injured its students.

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