Differentiate between the practice of hunting as a sport in India after the forest act were passed
Answers
In India, after the forest act was passed people were not allowed to hunt for their customary right or for their livelihood but they were allowed to hunt as a sport during British rule. This hunting was allowed in the pretext that the wild animals were threat to the human society and certain forest areas were exclusively reserved for hunting. Many animals have become extinct because of this.
Difference between the customary practice of hunting as a sport in India,
after the Forest Acts were passed:
i. Before the forest laws, many people who lived in or near forests had
survived by hunting deer, partridges and a variety of small
animals.This customary practice was prohibited by the forest laws.
ii. Those who were caught hunting were now punished for poaching.
While the forest laws deprived people of their customary rights to
hunt, hunting of big game became a sport. In India, hunting of tigers
and other animals had been part of the culture of the court and
nobility for centuries.
iii. Many Mughal paintings show princes and emperors enjoying a
hunt. But under colonial rule the scale of hunting increased to such
an extent that various species became almost extinct.
iv. The British saw large animals as signs of a wild, primitive and
savage society. They believed that by killing dangerous animals the
British would civilise India.
v. They gave rewards for the killing of tigers, wolves and other large
animals on the grounds that they posed a threat to cultivators. 0ver
80,000 tigers, 150,000 leopards and 200,000 wolves were killed for
reward in the period 1875-1925. Gradually, the tiger came to be
seen as a sporting trophy.
vi. The Maharaja of Sarguja alone shot 1,157 tigers and 2,000
leopards up to 1957. A British administrator, George Yule, killed 400
tigers. Initially certain areas of forests were reserved for hunting.
Only much later did environmentalists and conservators begin to
argue that all these species of animals needed to be protected, and
not killed.