Untitled Carousel Just 150 left in the wild, fight to save Great Indian Bustard is down to the wire Researchers this month sounded alarmed over koalas in Australia becoming "functionally extinct". Closer home, a critically endangered bird that lost out to the peacock to become India’s national bird may be next in line. There are now less than 150 Great Indian Bustards (GIBs) in the wild — a rapid decline from 2011 when their population was estimated at around 250.

NEW DELHI: Determined to shore up the plummeting numbers of critically endangered Great Indian Bustard and its smaller cousin Lesser Florican, the Supreme Court on Tuesday said overhead power transmission lines in the Desert National Park in Rajasthan’s Jaisalmer district and surrounding areas must go underground.The population of Great Indian Bustard, a tall bird with a wingspan of over two metres, declined from an estimated 1,260 in 1969 to around 150 in 2018. Lesser Florican, the smallest bird in the bustard family also known as ‘Likh’ or ‘Kharmore’, followed the same pattern with its numbers declining from 3,530 in 1999 to less than 700 in 2018, PIL petitioner and wildlife expert M K Ranjitsinh said.Around 15% of the two endangered species die every year because of collision with overhead power transmission lines in their flight path, a bench of Chief Justice S A Bobde and Justices B R Gavai and Surya Kant was told.“The best solution is to make overground power transmission lines go underground,” said the CJI, who was in no mood to allow more time to additional solicitor general Atmaram Nadkarni and Rajasthan’s additional advocate general Manish Singhvi to chalk out a strategy. He paid no heed to Nadkarni’s plea to await a report from officials of the ministry of environment and forests, who he said were in Jaisalmer.“It is well known that Great Indian Bustard is a large bird. It finds difficulty in manoeuvring easily around transmission lines. One of the solutions is to remove overhead transmission lines and lay them underground in the areas which are their habitat. Singhvi seeks time to take instruction from the Rajasthan government and tell the court the manner in which the power transmission lines can be laid underground,” the bench said and sought the response in two weeks.The SC on July 15 last year had taken serious note after senior advocate Shyam Divan raised alarm on behalf of Ranjitsinh and constituted a committee comprising the director of Bombay Natural History Society, ex-BNHS director Asad Rahmani and chief conservator of forests in Uttarakhand Dhananjai Mohan to study the problem and submit a report.On Tuesday, the SC accepted advocate Sugandha Yadav’s request for inclusion of Wildlife Institute of India scientist Sutirtha Dutta , director of Andhra Pradesh Biodiversity Board Thulsi Rao and lecturer in a Karnataka government college Samad Kottur in the expert panel on arresting the declining numbers of Great Indian Bustard and Lesser Florican.Ranjitsinh, along with other petitioners — Rajasthan-based wildlife activist Peera Ram Vishnoi, Gujarat-based wildlife activist Bapat Navinchandra Nanalal, Karnataka-based conservationist Edward Santosh Martin and Corbett Foundation — said both birds were protected under the Wild Life (Protection) Act, 1972 but despite highest level of protection under law, the birds faced the threat of imminent extinction.They blamed mortality caused by collision with power transmission lines and wind turbines, depletion of grasslands, hunting, development of mines and human habitation in and around their habitats and ingestion of pesticides as major reasons for fast depletion of their numbers.