Guwahati, Jan 20: Two male rhinos, injured and rescued during floods, were translocated on Tuesday from the Centre for Wildlife Rehabilitation and Conservation (CWRC) to Kaziranga National Park and Tiger Reserve, an official said.
Five-year-old Chandra and Kanai (4), were rescued in August 2020 and August 2021, respectively, and they were undergoing treatment at the CWRC since then.
The Park authorities followed the internationally accepted conservation translocation protocol in which after obtaining the requisite permissions from the Chief Wildlife Warden, Assam, under the Wildlife (Protection) Act, a site election committee was constituted to look for possible locations ideally suited for the pre-release enclosures.
The rhinos have been moved to a pre‑release enclosure, where they will be habituated to living under wild conditions before their final release to roam freely in the park, the official said.
The translocation operation was supervised by a team of veterinarians led by CWRC Centre-in-charge Bhaskar Choudhury along with experienced animal keepers.
Officials of Kaziranga National Park — Field Director Sonali Ghosh, DFO Arun Vignesh and range officers, subject matter experts Rathin Barman, Kaushik Barua and Anupam Sarmah — were present.
The rhino transfer is a testimony to the established rehabilitation protocols being followed in KNPTR, where every wild animal, especially the one‑horned rhinoceros, is given a chance to return to its natural home in the wild, even after experiencing severe stress due to calamities such as floods, the official said.
The CWRC was established in 2002 as a collaborative initiative between the Assam Forest Department, Wildlife Trust of India (WTI), and International Fund for Animal Welfare (IFAW).
Its primary role involves rescuing flood-distressed and orphaned wild animals—especially in Kaziranga—providing emergency care, hand-raising them, and rehabilitating fit individuals back into the wild through protocols like pre-release enclosures.
CWRC has rescued and handled over 7,397 animals across 357 species till date, with approximately 4,490 successfully released in the wild after treatment.
Earlier, 25 hand-raised rhinos were released after treatment — 23 in Manas National Park and two in Kaziranga. (PTI)
