Conservation of Gangetic dolphins to start soon

NEW DELHI: Headcount of aquatic animals is a difficult job. But that of Gangetic Dolphins (Platinista Gangetica) is not quite challenging, For dead dolphin remains are often found in the Ganga, Meghna and Brahmaputra banks. The river tigers, so known due to their predator role in maintaining riverine ecology, are also dying due to pollution by sewage and chemical wastes and habitats mauled by cruising.From Uttaranchal to Hooghly in West Bengal, particularly in UP and Bihar, this blind aquatic mammal is seriously threatened.
At a sensitising move the World Wide Fund for Nature (WWF) on Thursday drew creme de la creme Delhizens and tested their general knowledge on endangered species. Audience was stunned with delight to note a fair degree of awareness among such varied celebrity professionals as Sachin Pilot, Nanz Oberoi, Feroze Gujral, Shantanu and Nikhil Mehra, Ritu Kumar, Shivani Wazir.
A WWF official said in her thanksgiving note, "You're so knowledgeable! We didn���t expect that". Many others couldn't make the show for their part of intellectual drill.
Sanjeev Behera, WWF's dolphin-man and coordinator for freshwater and wetlands programme, has ambitious plans for WWF-sponsored dolphin conservation. Asked about it, he said, "We are taking all our partners in the country to build up a sanctuary for Gangetic dolphins."
He even presented a few slides for the celebrities, which, however, were oft-used by IUCN member of the catacean specialist group, Rabindra Kumar Sinha to sensitise locals in the Ganga basins from Uttaranchal to Hooghly and reported in the Press. A slide included even a Patna University Science College worker holding the live dolphin earlier rescued from fishing net by Sinha's team. The worker's photograph is often shown world over like a symbolic figure in Gangetic dolphin conservation.
Anuj Kumar Saxena, a Ghaziabad-based UP forest officer invited in the WWF programme, said, "We will soon start a joint programme on dolphin conservation with a fund already sanctioned by the government of India." The ministry of environment and forests mandarins are tight-lipped about it at present. "We will speak to you only after the Parliament session", said RB Lal when contacted for details about the conservation programme.