Maharashtra Assembly Approves Wildlife Bill, Focuses On Relocation And Sterilisation To Manage Conflicts

Mumbai: Although the state assembly on Wednesday passed the The Wildlife Protection (Amendment) Bill, 2026, which allows the state to take measures to control human-animal conflict, including granting permission for sterilisation and the relocation of animals from one protected zone to another; wildlife activits opine that the situation should not generalised across the state and the issue cannot be resolved unless humans behave sensibly.

In recent past, there have been several incidents of the wild cats' conflict with humans in Maharashtra, specially in areas of Junnar, Nashik and Ahilyanagar, following which the amendment bill was brought up in the assembly. Speaking on the increased population of leapords and human-animal conflicts, Advocate Pawan Sharma, Founder & President of RAWW (Resqink Association for Wildlife Welfare) said, "The situation with human leopard interactions, encounters and conflicts in Protected Areas is quite different from outside Protected Areas. Leopards living in farms and sugarcane fields (Nashik, Junnar) face different challenges than those in actual forests (SGNP). A scientific evaluation of the situation followed by science backed timely intervention is the need of the hour."

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However, Sharma added that although human life is paramount, there are wild cats which are problematic and rouge. "Sometimes there are cases where the specific individual animal becomes problematic and in that case it is important to identify that animal and capture it for lifetime captivity but there are multiple animals withing same landscape and overlapping territories. So random trapping should be avoided as it does more bad than good," Sharma said.

Activist Rohit Joshi, member of Joint Forest Management Commitee of SGNP, Yeoor said, "Unless humans behave sensibly no bill can prevent human-animal conflict, may it be urban areas of rural. Humans have to be careful in developments ensuring eco-sensitive zones are not encroached, not throw garbage- which attracts dogs, which are again favourite food for leopards, and if leopards are spotted they should not be harmed or scared off. The forest officials must be called and in coordination steps should be taken so that the wild cats go inside deep forests."

Explaining the situation in SGNP Joshi said, "In SGNP Thane side, the six lane Ghodbunder road has divided the Vasai-Palghar SGNP from Thane and Mumbai. Thus, the male leopard's territory which is anyway smaller than tiger has been reduced further. The wild cats have hardly place to pass around like earlier they did via Kolshet river towards Tungareshwar. The increased leopards numbers is not a problem, if they are increasing beyond naturally manageable population, the nature deals with it. Humans must avoid interfering in nature's cycle."

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In rural areas where several incidents of human-animal conflicts takes place is during their breeding season, when the leopards come outside in thick vegetation where they get camouflaged along with the new borns. If they are troubled if spotted by humans, they will attack.

The amendment act proposes reclassifying leopards from Schedule I to Schedule II, giving the state more flexibility in managing the species. Clarifying the government’s stand, forest minister Ganesh Naik told the House on Wednesday that the amendments would not lead to the issuance of permits to hunt wild animals, including leopards. Instead, Naik said, the changes would facilitate better management of human-wildlife conflict.

MLA Aaditya Thackeray who also participated in the debate on the house, posted on his X handle that he has received the assurances from the forest minister that leopards will not be proposed to be moved into schedule 2 from schedule 1 of the Wildlife Protection Act, 1972; No license/permit would be given to kill leopards, and a technical committee will be set up for a management plan for leopards and the animal- human conflict.

However, activists say that although the forest minister has assured in the assembly that leopards will not be moved to schedule 2 from schedule 1 and no permits will be given to kill them, the act is yet to be cleared by the centre.

A senior official from state forest department who did not wished to be quoted said, "The issue of human-animal conflict is serious on the ground. The amendment bill is a policy level decision taken by the government."

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