CHITRAL: The residents of Bokhtuli here have complained that the wildlife department has not issued a permit for trophy hunting of Kashmir markhor in area of conservancy of their village for the last 15 years.

Addressing a press conference here on Thursday, the village conservation committee (VCC) president Amanullah Khan said that people of Bokhtuli were honestly working for the conservation of markhor and biodiversity of the area, but they were being deprived of their right.

He said that the people had started conservation efforts 15 years ago and established VCC when makrhor population in the pasture of Bokhtuli village was hardly three to four, but their efforts over the years had now put the strength at 350 of which about 100 markhors were of trophy size.

He complained that despite rich population of markhor the department had never issued a hunting permit for the village, but the same had been given every year to a neighboring VCC, managed by an influential person.

“The influential person lures foreign hunters to his area of conservancy and even receives them when they land at the Islamabad airport,” he claimed.

Mr Khan said that the idea of VCC had been successful for conservation of biodiversity as 80 per cent of the income from the hunting permit was diverted to their collective development.

“It is a sheer injustice with the people of Bokhtuli not to issue a hunting permit for their pasture which is teeming with markhor population,” he said.

He alleged that the influential person was hoodwinking foreign hunters by presenting his private servants as the community members at the time of hunting in his pasture.

He claimed that there were markhors with trophy size of over 55 inches while last time a foreigner had hunted a markhor with 36 inches trophy from the area.

Mr Khan said that the only fault of the people of Bokhtuli was that they were poor and unable to speak English with foreigners and that they had no acquaintance with the authorities of wildlife department. He said that if this situation persisted the people could lose interest in the conservation work.

Published in Dawn, July 31st, 2015

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