Lions and tigers are carnivores but man is more, he is omnivore. The range of his omnivorousness at times transcends the limit of sanity. When it does, he can be a killer of the worst kind. In fact, he is the top predator. Fortunately there are sane people among the human kinds who present scientific and anthropological proof and evidence and try to persuade the non-believers of inter-species bond and environmental balance not to exterminate flora and fauna in the interest of survival of the 'most rational animal'.
But the animal at the top most order is also known for megalomaniac insanity that has turned quite a few of them the most dangerous mass murderers. Lions and tigers hardly kill their prey when they are not hungry but man can be a ruthless murderer for no reason, simply for the sadism that can be overpowering or at the heat of the moment. From fox hunting in Britain to big game hunting in Asia and Africa for trophies, taxidermy and other by-products, once carried out rampantly, had to be made illegal by enacting laws. But the practice goes on clandestinely courtesy of poachers.
How the killing instinct of the hunter-gatherer cave man had slid into aberration of game hunting is hardly any mystery. The invention of gun and emergence of the adventurous colonial macho man may have evolved to complement each other for this. Modern environmental scientists and ecologists have by now conclusively known the irrecoverable perils of random depletion and destruction of flora and fauna the world over. Disruption of ecological balance poses threat to the existence of man on this planet.
The problem is that not all are convinced of this fundamental scientific relational evidence. Each of them thinks if a person kills one Royal Bengal Tiger, an elephant or a lion in the wild Africa or a few migratory birds from a large flock, the heavens will not fall. What they forget is that others may harbour the same thought train. Consequently, the endangered species becomes still more endangered with their number dwindling continuously.
Poachers almost everywhere are professional criminals who kill animals from game reserves and would not hesitate to shoot down forest rangers in challenging situations. In this country, apart from such professional poachers, there are amateurs who are seasonal or occasional hunters. One thing they know for sure is that the animal or bird they target for killing is protected by law but they cannot resist the temptation simply because the meat and by-products of the games are in high demand. Their sole purpose is to make money out of something available in the wild and no individual claims its ownership. Anything considered no one's property or government's property can be abused.
Had people been gifted with a higher sense that each life is sacrosanct and cannot be thought of as a delicious dish on the dining table, much of the problem of game hunting and secret killing would vanish. The problem lies with some of the distorted religious interpretations that try to establish human superiority over all other creations. The idea is that those have been created for human consumption and comfort. There is no reason to think that uneducated people cannot appreciate the inter-species bonhomie.
When some not so educated villagers in remote corners of this land protect flocks of birds that choose their orchards or woods as their sanctuaries, it becomes quite clear how serious they are to defend the relations. A new generation of youths has happily come up to defend animals against all odds. Contrary to this, cruelty to animals, the trapping and use of poison baits for killing migratory birds in many beels of Tangail and Hakaluki haor, a sanctuary, bring to the fore rapacious murder mentality of a few, certainly not many.
The forest department has of late been able to limit poaching but still the bad blood in it, in collusion with infamous rings of poachers, contributes to depletion of forest resources, tragic deaths of animals and birds. Community conservation plan in this case may be highly effective. In case of killing migratory birds with poison baits, a campaign for boycotting such meat on the explanation that it has cancerous impacts on human health will definitely serve the purpose.
nilratanhalder2000@yahoo.com