Center publishes guidelines for exotic wild animals kept in captivity

Regulations pertaining to the ownership and reproduction of exotic wild animals in captivity have been announced by the Union Ministry of Environment, Forests, and Climate Change. Section 49M of the Wild Life (Protection) Act, 1972 is the basis for these regulations.

Such laws to control the reproduction and possession of very endangered exotic wild animals were absent from India. When the pandemic struck, the topic gained international attention since it was thought that Covid-19 was a “zoonotic disease” that had spread from China’s Wuhan wet market.

Since then, a number of nations have acknowledged the illicit wildlife trafficking, which might endanger the global population. For example, Vietnam briefly outlawed the import of wildlife and wildlife goods, while China outlawed the unlawful trading and eating of wild animals. Bolivia enacted a resolution outlawing the use of wild animals for therapeutic or culinary purposes.

According to regulations, individuals who own live specimens of exotic animal species must apply for registrations within six months of the laws’ launch date. Additionally, using the PARIVESH 2.0 site, within 30 days after obtaining such an animal species, report it to the State Chief Wild Life Warden in question.

The Wild Life (Protection) Amendment Act of 2022 is now in effect as of April 1st, 2023. Section 49 M of the Act deals with the registration of ownership, transfer, birth, and death of live scheduled animal species that are included in the Schedule IV of the Wild Life (Protection) Act, 1972, as well as the Appendices of CITES. The government released a notice on the legislative framework in April 2023.

The framework required exotic wild animal keepers to get a special license in order to produce and maintain exotic animals in captivity that are included in Appendix I of Schedule IV, which includes creatures that are very protected worldwide.

Following the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic in 2020, India published a notice on June 11th, 2020, offering amnesty to anyone in possession of exotic live species that are protected by the 183-country Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species of Wild Flora and Fauna (CITES), which India ratified in 1976.

The purpose of the amnesty, according to wildlife laws expert Debadityo Sinha, “was to encourage individuals to disclose their possession of exotic animals in order to create a database of CITES-listed animals in India so that the government would monitor births, deaths, trade, or change of possession of the animals in the future.”

Experts on wildlife, meantime, applaud the administration for deciding to provide the nation the necessary legislative framework.

Jose Louise, a wildlife crime investigator, states that “this legal framework is like something better than nothing.” “This framework will prevent exotic and protective animals that are highly endangered from being kept in captivity and use it as a means to further trade in them.”