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Published online 2 July 2008 | Nature 454, 14 (2008) | doi:10.1038/454014a
News in Brief
Entomologists jailed for illegal specimen hunt
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Even Indians (me too) doesnt know collecting insects is illegal. If it is illegal, the National Park authorites should mention that before people entering the park.
I can’t buy the excuse that the entomologists were unaware of rules and regulations for collecting. As entomologists working in the museum, sure should have knowledge about endangered species, collecting permits, exporting and importing permits etc. In my experience people ignore rules knowingly. Some entomologists, especially amateur collectors are in fact hunting for some rare insects to sell to wealthy collectors. I am aware that many butterfly collectors come to Darjeeling to collect butterflies such as Kaiser-I-hind, and other showy species. I am glad to know that the national park authorities have become more diligent. Unfortunately not too many Indians have knowledge about wildlife or its collection and trade. They definitely need to be educated. Meena Haribal
It is outrageous that an international effort is being organized by certain scientific communities to bail out entomologists who were collecting illegally in a biodiversity hotspot like the eastern Himalayas. The argument that the specimens collected by the Czech entomologists were of no commercial value misses the point. What matters is that they illegally collected specimens inside a national park completely disregarding the most important national biodiversity law that was conceived (however poorly) to protect and conserve wildlife. For decades, European and North American taxonomists and field biologists have poached specimens from developing countries for their work or museums and they have mostly got away with it. Forest officials from developing countries often get slammed for not enforcing conservation laws, even if they are usually not properly equipped, funded or trained for the job. Now that in this case the forest officials actually did something for which they should be praised and encouraged, it seems that a fraction of the international scientific community is ganging up against them in support of something that is obviously illegal and ethically wrong. It is a joke that the Czech entomologists did not know that they needed a collecting permit in India; after all, biologists complain the world over that India and Brazil have some of the most restrictive conservation laws anywhere, and that these laws have made collecting, research and international scientific collaborations extremely difficult, often hurting scientific development of these two countries. Besides, it is common knowledge among field biologists that they need official research and collecting permits in protected areas like national parks, irrespective of which country they are in. It is also unbelievable that they did not know they were in a national park. I have done enough field work in India in the past 20 years to know that one cannot casually take a walk from somewhere and land in a national park without knowing it. It seems to me that the Czechs did not care about Indian laws, imagining that they could get away one way or the other. Would they have tried to pull this off in Yellowstone National Park? Would curators at the Natural History Museum in London appeal similarly for the release of Japanese entomologists if they were charged with collecting illegally in an English conservation area? And for the record, only a tiny tiny minority of Indian entomologists is signing the petition to the Indian prime minister. I do feel sorry for the Czech entomologists for having to face a legal proceeding, which I imagine to be an unpleasant and thoroughly boring experience. However, it may be in their best interest, and in the best interest of the scientific community in the long run, if they acknowledge their error, accept the fine and come out clean. Otherwise I do not imagine the Indian Forest Department ever being friendly and receptive towards biologists (domestic or foreign), which will ultimately hurt research and conservation in India. I hope that with all this publicity it will finally dawn on the Western biologists that they need to respect conservation laws of the developing countries where they wish to work. If getting collecting permits on their own is difficult, they should perhaps collaborate with local scientists rather than go the easier but risky way of illegal collecting in a national park in a foreign country. -- Krushnamegh Kunte, University of Texas at Austin.