From fear to festivity: Multi‐stakeholder perspectives on human‐elephant conflict and coexistence in India

• Published date: 01 May 2022
• Author: Medha Nayak,Pranaya Kumar Swain
• Date: 01 May 2022
• DOI: http://doi.org/10.1002/pa.2496

ACADEMIC PAPER

From fear to festivity: Multi-stakeholder perspectives on

human-elephant conflict and coexistence in India

Medha Nayak | Pranaya Kumar Swain

School of Humanities and Social Sciences,

NISER Bhubaneswar, HBNI, Khurda, India

Correspondence

Pranaya Kumar Swain, School of Humanities

and Social Sciences, NISER Bhubaneswar,

HBNI, Jatni, Khurda, Odisha 752050, India.

Email: pranay@niser.ac.in

Funding information

Department of Atomic Energy, Government of

India; National Institute of Science Education

and Research (NISER), HBNI, Bhubaneswar

Humans and elephants have shared social, historical and ecological relations for ages.

However, their interactions have not been as pleasant as one would like that to be.

Although the problems associated with human-elephant conflict (HEC) are widely

known, the increasing rate and extent of conflicts suggest that improved strategies

are required to promote their co-existence. Several measures such as compensation

for loss of lives and livelihood, deployment of deterrents, erection of fences to

restrict the movements, promotion of conservation education to reduce antagonism,

preservation of forests and habitation, etc. have been adopted extensively to mitigate

human-elephant conflict and foster coexistence. Despite persistent efforts, the prob-

lem refuses to wither away. Stakeholders' perceptions and attitudes also vary widely

across the categories. Many studies show that the impacts of human-elephant con-

flict penetrate far deeper than the immediate threats from each other. This paper

attempts to understand the plurality of stakeholders' connect with elephants, their

perceptions, effectiveness of existing mitigation strategies and future of their coexis-

tence, drawing from empirical data. On the basis of inputs from key informants, focus

group discussions among community members and Forest Department officials and

field observations from one of the migratory elephant corridors of India, we locate

mixed perspectives from various stakeholders and their experiences and responses

to human-elephant conflict which, as we envisage, will go a long way in designing

participatory and community-based mitigation strategies.

1|INTRODUCTION

Human wildlife conflict have long been recognized as one of the most

challenging issues for human dominated landscapes and wildlife conser-

vation worldwide (Acharya, Paudel, Neupane, & Kohl, 2016;Anand&

Radhakrishna, 2017; Mukeka, Ogutu, Kanga, & Roskaft, 2019; Redpath

et al., 2013; Woodroffe, Thirgood, & Rabinowitz, 2005). Expanding

human population and its associated processes of forest degradation and

habitat destruction, fragmentation and change in landuse pattern have

altered available resources for both humans and wildlife population (de

Silva & Srinivasan, 2019;Lietal.,2018; Neupane, Kunwar, Bohara,

Risch, & Johnson, 2017;Ogra&Badola,2008). This has intensified com-

petition for space, forage and water resulting in animosities between

humans and wildlife for shared but limited resources, which manifest as

various types of conflict, such as crop-raiding, livestock predation, prop-

erty damage, human death and injury, and the retaliatory killing of wild-

life (Peterson, Birckhead, Leong, Peterson, & Peterson, 2010;White&

Ward, 2011). These conditions are particularly prominent in developing

countries (Baskaran, Kannan, Anbasaran, Thapa, & Sukumar, 2013;

Mukeka et al., 2019; Seoraj-Pillai & Pillay, 2016; Sukumar, 1990). Despite

the ubiquity of such negative interactions between humans and wildlife

and its increasing occurrence over time, there is always a want of strate-

gies to promote co-existence of wild animals and humans (Acharya

et al., 2016; Dickman, Macdonald, & Macdonald, 2011).

In India, human-elephant conflict (HEC) is the most pronounced

among all the wildlife-related interactions. The elephant is reportedly

one of the most conflict-prone wildlife species, causing large-scale

damage to crops and human lives (Gubbi, 2012). There has been a

Received: 7 September 2020 Accepted: 14 September 2020

DOI: 10.1002/pa.2496

J Public Affairs. 2022;22:e2496. wileyonlinelibrary.com/journal/pa © 2020 John Wiley & Sons Ltd 1of13

https://doi.org/10.1002/pa.2496