Environment & Ecology Quiz: Wild Life (Protection) Act, 1972 and Its Schedules

The Wild Life (Protection) Act received the assent of the President on 9 September 1972 and remains the principal wildlife law of the country, covering hunting, protected areas, trade in animal articles and the schedules of protected species.

The amendment of 2022 rationalised the schedules of the parent Act: Schedule I now lists animals given the highest protection, Schedule II lists animals with a lesser degree of protection, Schedule III lists specified plants and Schedule IV lists specimens figuring in the appendices of the Convention on International Trade…

In the restructured Act the plant schedule moved from the old Schedule VI to the new Schedule III, and it still protects a short list of species such as the blue vanda, the pitcher plant and other threatened orchids and cycads, whose uprooting and trade are controlled.

Section 35 empowers the State Government to declare an area of adequate ecological or zoological importance as a national park, where no grazing is permitted and no rights of any person are allowed to continue.

The National Board for Wild Life was created by the amendment of 2002 under Section 5A of the Act as the apex advisory body on wildlife, and the Prime Minister chairs it.

That amendment inserted Section 36A for conservation reserves, usually declared on government land next to a national park or sanctuary, and Section 36C for community reserves, declared on private or community land where people volunteer to protect wildlife.

The amendment of 1991 inserted Chapter IVA into the Act and created the Central Zoo Authority, which lays down standards for housing and upkeep of animals, recognises or derecognises zoos and regulates the exchange of animals between them.

The peacock is the national bird of India and was placed in Schedule I, the group given the highest protection, so it could never be treated as vermin.

Article 252 allows Parliament to legislate on a State subject for two or more States when the legislatures of those States pass resolutions asking it to do so, and the law then applies to those States and to any other State that adopts it later.

Section 51 of the Act prescribes this enhanced punishment, along with a fine, for offences against animals given the highest protection, and the amendment of 2022 raised the monetary penalties further.