Javadekar made this revelation during his maiden visit to Kaziranga National Park today where he attended an interactive session with representatives of various organisations and the public at the convention centre here.

He said he would also ask the CBI how far the investigation has reached and speak to Prime Minister Narendra Modi and Union home minister Rajnath Singh to expedite the investigation.

Dispur had approached the central government requesting a CBI probe into cases of rhino poaching, after an unprecedented spate of poaching cases were reported since July 2012 and facing severe criticism from various quarters of the society.

Accordingly, the agency has registered three cases related to poaching of rhinos that took place in July and September 2012 in Karbi Anglong and Nagaon districts. Javadekar accompanied by state forest minister Rakibul Hussain and other high-ranking officials from both the Union and state forest department arrived at Bokakhat by a chopper from Guwahati from where he proceeded to Kohora. During a half-an-hour interaction with the people, the minister heard all issues related to the national park starting from erosion of park land by Brahmaputra river, encroachment by suspected Bangladeshi migrants, relaxation in the norms of proposed eco-sensitive zone and modernisation of forest guards protecting the national park.

“We are taking very seriously the matter of the large scale encroachment of forest lands by suspected Bangladeshi migrants and will take a concrete step regarding the matter after consultation with the Union home ministry,” Javadekar said, while assuring the people.

“Development and protection of the national park will go hand in hand and we are ready to reduce the radius of eco-sensitive zone from 10km to 500m within one month from the date of receiving proposal from the state government regarding the matter,” Javadekar said.

At the beginning of the interactive session, people protested against the writing of the banner prepared by the state forest department which read Welcome to Kaziranga Tiger Reserve and demanded that it should have been Welcome to Kaziranga National Park. At this state forest minister Rakibul Hussain assured the people that from now on the state forest department would always use the sentence World Heritage Site Kaziranga National Park in every official communication.

Earlier, the central minister attended a public meeting in Guwahati where he met representatives of non-governmental organisations and student unions. Non-governmental organisations and student unions apprised the minister of the failure of state authorities in controlling rhino poaching.

The minister assured to “find out ways to bring the crisis to an end.” There is need to work both with the Centre and the state government to find out a workable solution. He insisted on the participation of people particularly the forest fringe people for the protection of forest and wildlife. All Assam Students’ Union adviser Samujjal Bhattacharyya spoke on the security measures in the Kaziranga National Park.

“How will forest personnel respond to the poachers who have sophisticated arms?” the AASU adviser asked. Representatives of Aaranyak have called for ensuring that for every rhino poaching case, forest officials file a direct complaint case at the CJM under the Wildlife Protection Act 1972 besides filing an FIR at the nearest police station. Conviction of rhino poachers is a must to deter criminals engaged in rhino poaching.