Advantages of thick skin
the indefinite hunger strike of villagers around Kaziranga, Assam, against the growing number of attacks on their fields and dwellings by elephants is another example of the people's wrath at being made scapegoats in the name of conservation. An apathetic government and blinker-wearing wildlife managers are letting things run out of hand even as they grope for answers. At the same time, conservationists are "making hay' by urging international wildlife activists and organisations to "pressurise the Indian government' to take stronger steps to preserve the elephant by providing foresters with guns and ammunition, jeeps, surveillance equipment, as well as setting up anti-poaching squads.
In this mad rush to save the elephant, the immediate problems