28 October 2017

India’s Wildlife Trafficking Epidemic

By Neeta Lal

No sooner had India wrapped up celebrations of its annual “Wildlife Week” (October 2-8) — spotlighting the richness and diversity of its flora and fauna — than the sensational conviction of a notorious group of Indian wildlife traffickers grabbed headlines. The gang was involved in smuggling the body parts of 125 tigers and 1,200 leopards. But what had animal activists up in arms was the disproportionately small punishment (four years in jail) meted out to the criminals compared to the magnitude of the crime they had committed.

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