The Bihar state government has hired professional shooters to wipe off Nilgai from the entire state in a bid to protect farms. More than 200 Nilgai (blue bulls) were shot dead in 3 days in Mokama area of Bihar, as part of this operation. What is even more worrying is that the Central Environment Ministry allowed this brutal massacre.

These animals have been accused of foraying into farmlands and raiding crops, thereby causing losses worth crores of rupees to farmers. Instead of building sanctuaries for them, or shifting them into existing ones (there are several sanctuaries in Bihar and its neighbouring states), the best solution that environment minister Mr Prakash Javadekar and Bihar chief minister Mr Nitish Kumar could come up with was to kill the animals.

Not realising his mistake, Mr Javadekar went on to say that the permit to shoot the blue bulls is valid till November in 31 of Bihar's 39 districts. Mr Neeraj Kumar, a leader of Bihar's ruling party Janata Dal United, who organised the licensed hunt said such culling "was needed".

Animals are easy targets. They cannot protest. So, if they are causing a menace, cull them - is the motto of these ministers. The environment ministry's and government's failure to come up with better solutions to avoid man-animal conflict, and simply adopt the policy of 'just kill' is dangerous. The ministry has given similar permissions in Gujarat, in Uttarakhand and Maharashtra for wild boars and Nilgai, and in Himachal Pradesh for rhesus macaques.

We request the ministers to realise that animals are as much a part of the eco-system as human beings and have equal claim on land and nature. Killing animals is equal to murdering human beings. The brutality on Nilgai in Bihar must immediately be stopped and the Environment Ministry's policy to 'kill' animals anywhere in the country must be revoked.