The two hour sit-in was staged against the government’s negligency towards wildlife protection and the ineffectiveness of Forest Minister Rockybul Hussain in dealing with rampant poaching activities in the National Park.

The protest was participated by organizations like the Aranyak, Nature’s Beacon, Kaziranga Wildlife Society, Dolphin Foundation, Gibbon Conservation Centre, Ecosystem India, amongst others.

With banners like “Face people, face the crisis, running away will not solve the problem, chief wildlife warden must resign,” hundreds of wildlife activities spoke against the problems plaguing the Forest Department.

“Instead of shying away from its responsibility, the Forest Minister should take responsibility for the lack of wildlife security in Kaziranga National Park,” said an activist.

Meanwhile, slamming the Chief Minister for his irresponsible statement on the number of rhino deaths during his tenure and that during the AGP regime, Soumyadeep Dutta of Nature’s Beacon said, “The Chief Minister should be ashamed of himself for comparing figures of rhino deaths between his and the AGP government’s rule.” He added, “The Forest minister have cheated the people of Assam. He had said that a CBI probe was ordered into rhino killing months ago, but the recent attack on rhinos has revealed that no CBI probe had been ordered until now.”

Another activist of the wildlife group Aranyak said, “There are some honest officials in the Forest department, who are willing to work for wildlife protection. The main problem lies with some higher officials, who have no compassion for the animals.”

The activists further questioned as to why the DFO of Kaziranga National Park was not sacked despite repeated evidence of negligency?

On the other hand, Kaziranga Wildlife Society general secretary Rajiv Saikia blamed the illegal settlements of suspected foreigners in and around Kaziranga as the root cause of the problem.“Every year in the name of rehabilitation, more and more outsiders are given settlements in and around the Kaziranga National Park. It has been observed that most of the crime on animals are traced back to these settlers,” he said, adding that unless these illegal settlers are evicted, KNP would soon be transformed into a cultivation field by these illegal settlers.