Environment & Ecology Quiz: Bird Sanctuaries and Marine Protected Areas

The correct answer is D, Karnataka. The Bankapura Peacock Sanctuary lies within the ruins of Bankapura fort in Haveri district of Karnataka and is one of the very few protected areas in India notified specifically for the Indian peafowl, the national bird. Option A is wrong because Rajasthan, though rich in peafowl, is remembered in this chapter for Keoladeo National Park at Bharatpur and for the Desert National Park, not for a peacock sanctuary. Option B is wrong because Maharashtra's names in this chapter are the Malvan Marine Sanctuary and the mangrove areas of the Konkan coast. Option C is wrong because Madhya Pradesh is associated with tiger reserves such as Kanha and Bandhavgarh and with the National Chambal Sanctuary rather than with a peacock sanctuary.

The correct answer is A, Rajasthan. Keoladeo National Park stands at Bharatpur in eastern Rajasthan and is unusual in being a man-made wetland, created by a ruler of Bharatpur as a duck shooting reserve and later turned into a sanctuary and then a national park. It is both a Ramsar site and a World Heritage Site, and it was famous as the wintering ground of the Siberian crane. Option B is wrong because Gujarat's best known bird wetland is Nal Sarovar, with Thol and Khijadia beside it. Option C is wrong because Haryana's wetland of this kind is Sultanpur National Park near Gurugram. Option D is wrong because Uttar Pradesh is associated with the sarus crane, its state bird, and with wetlands such as Upper Ganga rather than with Keoladeo.

The correct answer is A, Gahirmatha Marine Sanctuary. Gahirmatha, on the Odisha coast beside the Bhitarkanika mangroves, is the only turtle sanctuary notified in India and protects the world's largest mass nesting ground of the olive ridley turtle, where the phenomenon of arribada, or mass nesting, takes place. Option B is wrong because the Gulf of Mannar off Tamil Nadu is remembered as India's first marine biosphere reserve and as the stronghold of the dugong. Option C is wrong because the Malvan Marine Sanctuary in Maharashtra protects a small patch of reef and shore rather than turtle rookeries. Option D is wrong because Rani Jhansi Marine National Park lies in the Andaman and Nicobar Islands and protects reefs and islands, not a turtle sanctuary. Remember the pairing of species with place: olive ridley at Gahirmatha, dugong in the Gulf of Mannar, saltwater crocodile at Bhitarkanika and tiger in the Sundarbans.

The correct answer is B, Marine National Park, Gulf of Kachchh. Declared in Gujarat in 1980, it was the first area in India to be notified as a marine national park, and it covers a chain of islands carrying coral reefs and mangrove along the Gulf of Kachchh. Option A is wrong because the Mahatma Gandhi Marine National Park at Wandoor in South Andaman was notified in 1983, after the Gujarat park. Option C is wrong because the Gulf of Mannar holds a different distinction: it was declared India's first marine biosphere reserve in 1989, and the two superlatives are the pair examiners most often swap. Option D is wrong because the Sundarbans, though a mangrove area on the coast, was notified as a national park for the tiger and is not classed as a marine national park.

The correct answer is C, Odisha. Chilika is a brackish water lagoon on the Odisha coast, the largest of its kind in Asia, separated from the Bay of Bengal by a long sand bar. The island of Nalaban within it is notified as a bird sanctuary, and Chilika was among the first Indian wetlands to be designated a Ramsar site; it is also known for the Irrawaddy dolphin. Option A is wrong because West Bengal's great coastal wetland is the Sundarbans. Option B is wrong because Andhra Pradesh has Pulicat and Kolleru, and Pulicat, the second largest brackish lagoon of India, is shared with Tamil Nadu. Option D is wrong because Tamil Nadu's names here are Point Calimere and Vedanthangal. A useful pairing is that Chilika is the largest brackish water lagoon of Asia while Pulicat, shared between Andhra Pradesh and Tamil Nadu, is the second largest in India.

The correct answer is B, Pitti. Pitti is a tiny uninhabited coral islet in Lakshadweep, notified as the Pitti Bird Sanctuary, and is the breeding ground of sooty terns and other sea birds; it is the only wildlife sanctuary of the territory. Option A is wrong because Nalaban is the island sanctuary inside Chilika Lake in Odisha. Option C is wrong because Nal Sarovar is a shallow freshwater lake in Gujarat, a Ramsar site known for flamingos and pelicans. Option D is wrong because Deepor Beel is a Ramsar site and bird sanctuary on the edge of Guwahati in Assam, fed by the Brahmaputra. All three distractors are genuine bird areas, which is what makes the question a test of location rather than of names.

The correct answer is B, 1971. The Convention on Wetlands was signed in the Iranian city of Ramsar in 1971, which is why the sites designated under it are called Ramsar sites; it came into force in 1975, India became a party in 1982, and World Wetlands Day is observed on 2 February to mark the date of signature. Option A is wrong because 1968 is not associated with any of the major conservation treaties asked in these papers. Option C is wrong because 1979 is the year of the Convention on Migratory Species, signed at Bonn, which deals with migratory animals rather than with wetlands. Option D is wrong because 1992 is the year of the Earth Summit at Rio de Janeiro, which produced the Convention on Biological Diversity and the climate change convention.

The correct answer is A, The Book of Indian Birds. Salim Ali wrote this standard field guide, carried out the bird surveys on which several sanctuaries were notified, and was long associated with the Bombay Natural History Society; the Salim Ali Centre for Ornithology and Natural History at Coimbatore bears his name. Option B is wrong because, although he did support the campaign to save the Silent Valley, that is only one episode and not what he is chiefly identified with. Option C is wrong because the Chipko movement of the Garhwal Himalaya is associated with Sunderlal Bahuguna and Chandi Prasad Bhatt and concerned tree felling, not birds. Option D is wrong because Project Tiger, launched in 1973, is associated with Kailash Sankhala as its first director.

The correct answer is B, Gulf of Mannar. The dugong is a marine mammal that grazes on sea grass, and the sea grass beds of the Gulf of Mannar between Tamil Nadu and Sri Lanka are its principal habitat in India; the Gulf of Mannar was declared the country's first marine biosphere reserve in 1989 and the dugong is listed in Schedule I of the Wild Life (Protection) Act. Option A is wrong because the Sundarbans is a mangrove forest identified with the tiger and the estuarine crocodile. Option C is wrong because Gahirmatha is remembered for the olive ridley turtle. Option D is wrong because Bhitarkanika in Odisha is known for the saltwater crocodile and for its mangroves, not for the dugong. Sea grass beds, coral reefs and mangroves are the three habitats a marine protected area guards, and the dugong depends on the first of the three.

The correct answer is A, Harike. The Harike wetland in Punjab, also called Hari-Ke-Pattan, was formed by a barrage at the point where the Beas joins the Sutlej, is the largest wetland of northern India, and is a Ramsar site rich in waterfowl. Option B is wrong because Pong Dam Lake in Himachal Pradesh is a reservoir on the Beas, also a Ramsar site, known for bar-headed geese, but it is not at a river confluence of this kind. Option C is wrong because Sambhar in Rajasthan is the largest inland saline lake of India, visited by flamingos. Option D is wrong because Renuka in Himachal Pradesh is a small natural lake and Ramsar site, famous as a pilgrimage place rather than for its size.

The correct answer is B, the Wild Life (Protection) Act, 1972. This Act provides for the declaration of national parks and wildlife sanctuaries, lists protected species in its schedules, and, after the amendment of 2002, added two further categories, conservation reserves and community reserves. Option A is wrong because the Indian Forest Act, 1927 deals with reserved and protected forests and the movement of forest produce, not with wildlife areas. Option C is wrong because the Environment (Protection) Act, 1986, passed after the Bhopal disaster, is the umbrella law for pollution control and for notifications such as coastal regulation zones. Option D is wrong because the Biological Diversity Act, 2002 gives effect to the Convention on Biological Diversity and created the biodiversity boards and heritage sites.