More tigers are being introduced in Sariska Tiger Reserve in Rajasthan’s Alwar district this monsoon under the recovery plan of the tiger habitat which lost all its big cats to alleged poaching some time in 2004-5. Most of the six tigers reintroduced in the past four years, starting with the first male tiger in June-July 2008, were released during this season.

And if Sariska needs more tigers, where would the Rajasthan authorities look for other than the Ranthambhore National Park, which at present has an actively breeding cat population? All the tigers in Sariska are from Ranthambhore though there is a proposal to get one or two from the forests of neighbouring Madhya Pradesh.

JODHPUR: After deployment of 115 border homeguard commandos for the security of the oil fields of Cairn India at Barmer, the Governor of Rajasthan Margaret Alva has declared this entire area prohibited through a notification. Any persons trespassing in this prohibited area will be prosecuted now on.

This measure is another step to ensure security of the oil fields by the state government. Barmer oil fields are contributing 30% to the total domestic oil production, which is set to grow further from the current 1.75 lakh barrel per day (bpd).

JAIPUR: The state government on Monday extended the status of scarcity affected areas to 3739 villages of 11 districts. These villages were given this status due failed rabi crop but the extension has been given after witnessing deficient rainfall. The relief activities in these districts villages will now continue till August 15, 2012.

Earlier in March, due to failure of Rabi crop 'scarcity affected' was declared in Ajmer, Barmer, Churu, Nagaur and Jaisalmer districts.

Jaipur: Chief minister Ashok Gehlot on Monday assured the Centre that the state would abide by the all the regulations with regard to drawing power from the Northern Grid. The assurance came during the chief ministers’ and state power ministers’ meeting on Grid Supply Management held in Delhi, and presided over by Union power minister Veerappa Moily.

Gehlot also emphasized on the state’s increased requirement of power due to a poor monsoon and the wide gap between demand and availability. He requested for an additional 500 MW of power apart from the state’s defined quota for the forthcoming rabi season, besides an urgent need to address the irrigation requirement for the kharif crops.

A journalist and his cameraman, who were working on a story on illegal mining in the region, were allegedly assaulted by the goons of the local mining mafia at a village here.

The duo, working with a local news channel, had gone to Nibhore village here on Friday night to cover the story when the incident took place, Superintendent of Police Umesh Chand Dutta said, adding the accused, Rajpal and Girdhari, were arrested on Saturday.

JAIPUR: Underweight newborns are not only common in rural areas but also in big cities of the state. The annual health survey released by the Centre recently said it is common problem of both urban and rural areas.

In Jaipur 31.7% infants have weights less than 2.5kg at birth. Infants born with weight less than 2.5kg were 30% in Jaipur urban area while the figure is 33.9% in Jaipur rural areas.

Jaipur: The ghosts of the grid breakdowns that plunged half of India into darkness last week may continue to haunt us as the network remains susceptible to wild overdrawing by state governments in the face of increasing demand and poor capacity addition. But there is light at the end of the tunnel.

Even as the Central Electricity Regulatory Commission (CERC) meets on August 14 to get to the bottom of the blackouts, 22-year-old Yashraj Khaitan, a graduate from the University of California, feels that the power

Jaipur: The recently notified buffer zone for the Sariska tiger reserve seems to have got a better deal. About 250 sq km was added to the CTH of the reserve.
According to sources, “The buffer zone here is a continuous chain of land unlike the fragmented buffer of Ranthambore. However, the buffer area in the north western and southern part of the CTH here is much more than the other parts.”

For creating the buffer zone in Sariska, parts of forest land from the Alwar and Jaipur forest division were included. While areas such as Sirawas, Digani and Bhasra were included from the Alwar forest division, the Digota block of the Jamua Ramgarh sanctuary was included from the Jaipur forest division.

The Reserve Had To Bear The Brunt After NTCA Guidelines Were Implemented To Create A Critical Tiger Habitat

Jaipur: It was a National Tiger Conservation Authority (NTCA) guideline way back in 2006 that eventually left the Ranthambore tiger reserve bereft of enough forest area on the periphery that could be declared as a buffer zone after the Supreme Court directives now. Though the state forest department has notified a buffer zone for the Ranthambore tiger reserve after the Supreme Court directives but instead of a continuous, peripheral zone, the buffer in this case is fragmented, isolated pieces of land at various corner of the critical tiger habitat. Sources revealed that soon after the Scheduled Tribes and Other Traditional Forest Dwellers (Recognition of Forest Rights) act in 2006, the NTCA came up with guidelines for declaring Critical Tiger Habitats (CTH) for reserves across the country.

In a dubious distinction, Rajasthan has topped the list of states with kids being born underweight. In about nine states in northern, central and eastern India, where nearly half of the country’s population lives, a quarter of the children born in 2010-11 were underweight, that is, less than 2.5kg in weight at the time of birth.

In Rajasthan, the proportion was as high as 39% with Jharkhand not far behind with about 36% children born underweight. In Madhya Pradesh and UP about 28% of newborns are underweight while in Bihar and Odisha about 22% fall in this category.