Bears Digging Graves in KASHMIR!

By Our Wildlife Correspondent

In Kashmir digging out corpses from the graves by security people is not that uncommon. At times it is done to identify the deceased if there are some cases. But recently wild bears starved of their food in nature are digging out the corpses to the horror of the villagers. The problem is so acute that the villagers have to take turns guarding the graves to ward off the beasts but to no avail. Normally, exhuming a body is not allowed in Islam.

The largest mammal in Kashmir coming down all the way from the mountains are roaming in residential areas in search of food posing danger to people’s lives and their livestock. Last year, a study carried out by Wildlife SOS, a New Delhi- based wildlife conservation organisation, revealed that 75  percent  of  food items in Himalayan brown bears’ diet in Kashmir was scavenged from garbage including plastic carry bags, milk powder, chocolate wrappers and biryani (rice and meat preparation).

Normal food of brown bears, an omnivorous animal is insects, small crustaceans, alpine bulbs, roots of plants, shoots of young grasses, domestic goats, sheep and voles. They are nocturnal, with a sharp sense of smell, believed to be their principal means of finding food.

The brown bear goes into hibernation around October and emerges around April and May. Now a days its hibernation period seems to be reducing. It has been observed to prefer open valleys and pastures and during summer, it moves as high as 5,500 metres and returns to the valleys in the autumn. The Himalayan brown bears are listed as “critically endangered” in the International Union for the Conservation of Nature Red List. And the future doesn’t offer much hope. Its population has been steadily declining in the past century with only an estimated 500-750 bears left in India, reports said. According to a study carried out in the western Himalayas by scientists of the Zoological Survey of India in 2020, there will be a decline of about 73 per cent of the bear’s habitat by 2050.

The beast is threatened by habitat destruction due to various anthropogenic pressures such as habitat encroachment, tourism, and grazing pressure.The scientists predicted a significant reduction in suitable habitat and biological corridors of the species in a climate change scenario, prompting them to recommend “pre-emptive spatial planning of PAs in the Himalayan region for the long- term viability of the species”. The increasing incidents of conflict between Himalayan brown bears with people in Kashmir only further bears out this study.