BHOPAL: Country’s public radio broadcaster, the All India Radio (AIR-Akashvani) has a new role to play in Madhya Pradesh – alerting people about movement of wild animals, including elephants, tigers and leopards to prevent human-animal conflicts and related casualties.The AIR-Shahdol has started alerting and educating the villagers in Shahdol, Umaria and Anuppur districts, not just about movement of elephants, tigers and leopards, but also on the do’s and don’ts on encountering them.Such alerts and audio clips developed with the state forest department’s help are being interspersed with popular programs, particularly music and farmers-oriented programs.This development is inspired by similar AIR services in adjoining Chhattisgarh about the movement of elephants. The Chhattisgarh initiative that has drastically reduced human-elephant conflicts had been applauded by the PM Narendra Modi also.According to forest department sources, the alerts through the AIR is just one component of a detailed wild elephants and their habitat management plan, which is being formulated for monitoring the elephant movements and measures to mitigate human-elephant conflicts.
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