School children take out procession to conserve wildlife

Berhampur: Dressed as wild animals, school children on Sunday held a procession in Berhampur town to spread awareness on conservation of the animals.

Organised by the Berhampur Forest Division and Ganjam District Environment Society to mark the Wildlife Week, the colourful rally was also attended by several forest officials, wildlife lovers and school teachers.

Students of at least ten schools in the town took part in the rally, which assumed significance as poachers are active in the district.

The poachers had killed five elephants in the last ten days in the district, besides ten other animals like barking deer, deer, wild bore and pangolin in the span of a year.

"Ganjam has a unique and rich bio-diversity with several rare and endangered wild animals. These include black-buck, Olive Ridley turtles, crocodile (magar), fresh water turtle, peacock, pangolin, elephants and leopards," DFO, Berhampur S S Mishra said.

Stressing the need for their conservation, the DFO also suggested the school teachers take their students to the wildlife habitat areas to gain knowledge on wildlife preservation.