A total of 595 wild animals have perished in the floods that have ravaged the 1,033-km Kaziranga Tiger Reserve in Assam.
Confirming this, the Ministry of Environment and Forests on Monday said a spot appraisal by Dr M. Firoz Ahmad, Member, National Tiger Conservation Authority, said the highest mortality was of the hog deer at 512, followed by wild boars, rhinos, sambars and swamp deer.
The park management has deployed 24x7 surveillance and intense patrolling of staff along the highways, the Ministry said in a release.
It said to safeguard wild animals from drowning in floods, artificial mounds and bunds have had been created.
However, it denied large-scale poaching and said most of the rhino deaths were from the older age group, besides calves, and only three of them had been poached.
The spot report called for relieving the corridor areas from human pressure and avoiding change in the land use pattern.
Towards this end, the Ministry said an alternate alignment had been agreed upon for diverting or widening National Highway-37.
It said since the highway was in use, the National Highways Authority of India would be approached for providing flyovers at vantage points for the traffic to prevent road hits, while providing safe passage for wild animals from beneath.