Environment and Disaster Management › Biodiversity governance

Human wildlife conflict and wildlife crime

Conflict between people and wild animals, compensation for the loss, and wildlife crime: poaching, seizures and the trade in live animals and their parts. Prelims has asked which of a set of animals, the star tortoise among them, are found naturally in India.

Foundation note: Human wildlife conflict: what the Act allows, who pays, and the crime bureau

UPSC has asked

Prelims 2013: species found naturally in India, including the star tortoise

Showing 1 of 3 articles, those that changed from 1 to 30 September 2026.Show all

Wildlife crime

Orangutans

Prelims and Mains

Orangutans are the only great apes in Asia, and they live wild only on Borneo and Sumatra.

They have no wild range in India, so one found here can only have been brought in, which makes such a case a trafficking question rather than a conservation one.
All three species, the Bornean, the Sumatran and the Tapanuli, are Critically Endangered on the IUCN Red List and in CITES Appendix I.
The Wildlife Crime Control Bureau is the statutory body that takes up a trafficking investigation.

What changed

16 Sep 2026
- All orangutan species are in Appendix I of CITES, whose trade is allowed only exceptionally and not for commerce.
- For a confiscated animal the Environment Ministry consults the State of origin; repatriation is at that State's cost, and otherwise the animal goes to a rescue centre.
- The 2022 amendment to the Wild Life (Protection) Act added a schedule of CITES listed species and mirrors this procedure.
The Indian Express, 16 Sep 2026: Orangutans in Odisha: Does India have to repatriate the primates? What law says (opens in a new tab)

UPSC has asked

Prelims 2023: which animal makes a tool from a stick

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