Kerala faced rising human animal conflicts and weakened wildlife protection in 2025

Kochi: The year that passed by proved to be tumultuous for forests, wildlife conservation and people living in the high ranges. The shelving of the Kerala Forest (Amendment) Bill 2024, originally intended to strengthen forest protection, set the tone for unscientific developments in the ensuing months. The year, as usual, was marked by a spate of suspicious wildlife deaths, unchecked proliferation of roads and surge in human-animal encounters within forests and in their fringe areas.Instead of mitigating the root causes of these crises, the state govt pushed through a controversial Wildlife Protection (Kerala Amendment) Bill 2025, widely viewed as serving political interests rather than offering meaningful solutions to ecological and human safety concerns. Compounding this was the fear of climate change-induced impacts.The year opened on a grim note in the high ranges. In Jan, a wild elephant trampled a tribal man to death in Nilambur forest. The incident was not an aberration. As many as 24 people have lost their lives in the human-animal interactions reported in forests and their fringe areas in the state so far this fiscal year. A majority of them belonged to the marginalised tribal community, whose daily livelihoods necessitate frequent movement through forest landscapes, placing them in direct and repeated contact with wildlife. Meanwhile, forests across the state are increasingly getting fragmented by linear infrastructure, steadily dismantling the traditional animal movement corridors and intensifying the frequency of human-animal encounters with each passing day.Amid public outrage and a surge in encounters, the forest department launched 10 special missions earlier this year, aimed at mitigating the crisis. They include the removal of invasive alien plant species from forest areas. In parallel, in an effort to pacify affected communities and families of victims, the state govt declared the human-animal encounters a state-specific disaster, a move that helps the immediate release of compensation.However, discarding the root causes for the incidents and the impending threat of climate change looming large over the state, 2025 saw both chief minister and forest minister calling for culling of wild animals, unbecoming of the so-called most civilised and environmentally conscious state in the country.Eyeing electoral gains, the state govt appeared increasingly willing to echo the demands of fringe groups as well as influential mining and tourism lobby in the high ranges alongside a religious group that propagated the narrative of surging wild animal population requiring culling. Unlike in previous years, human-animal encounters emerged as a dominant theme, with all political parties striking a more vocal posture on "addressing" the issue due to the recent local body polls and the assembly elections due in early 2026.The political consensus culminated in the passage of the detrimental wildlife protection bill in the assembly this year, formulated in violation of central statutes and weakening the conservation ethos. "There were no takers for the claims made by the state govt in the high ranges in the local body elections. However, the run-up to the assembly elections will see intensified lobbying by groups with vested interests," observed Wayanad Prakriti Samrakshana Samiti president Badusha.Luckily, Kerala was spared of any major natural disasters in 2025, offering some measure of relief to the otherwise fraught year. However, the year was marked by troubling developments in the high ranges including the suspicious deaths of four tigers in Wayanad and an entire herd of elephants in Malayattoor, incidents that triggered inquiries and renewed concern over wildlife protection and enforcement.