World Crocodile Day

22 June, 2020

3 Min Read

GS-III :

World Crocodile Day

World Crocodile Day

World Crocodile Day is celebrated on 17th June. The day is a global awareness campaign to highlight the plight of endangered crocodiles and alligators around the world.

Crocodile spices found in India includes

Mugger or Marsh Crocodile
Estuarine or Saltwater Crocodile
Gharial or River water Crocodile

Human-crocodile conflict Hotspots in India includes

Vadodara in Gujarat (in Vishwamitri river)
Kota in Rajasthan,
Bhitarkanika in Odisha
Andaman and Nicobar Islands (Culling had been recommended a few years back in the Andaman and Nicobar islands by the forest department to the MoEFCC)

Indian Crocodile Conservation Project

The Crocodile Conservation Project was launched in 1975 in different States. The Gharial and Saltwater crocodile conservation programme was first implemented in Odisha in early 1975 and subsequently the Mugger conservation programme was initiated.

Gharial crocodile project started in Tikarpada (1975) aims to increase the sighting to five crocodiles per kilometer length of water.
As a result of the programme, the estimated number of the saltwater crocodiles increased from 96 in 1976 to 1,640 in 2012 in India.

CrocBITE

CrocBITE is an online database of crocodile attacks reported on humans. The non-profit online research tool helps to scientifically analyze crocodile behavior via complex models.

Users are encouraged to feed information in a crowdsourcing manner, the uploaded information needs to be verifiable.
The database provides key insights into crocodile attack patterns and draws inferences to save human lives.
The information is vital for Australia and Africa where such attacks are more likely than in other parts of the world.
This is the only database of its kind with such comprehensive collection of information made available online.

Source: IE