Saving Hangul
Only a few hundred Hanguls, the fabled Kashmir stag, are reported to cling to survival. Once they roamed the valley in thousands. Today, fewer than 270 remain. Chief Minister Omar Abdullah’s confession that he has never truly seen one in the wild, despite living a short drive away, captures the tragedy: Kashmir’s own state animal has become a ghost in its homeland.
At a recent international conference in Srinagar, the Chief Minister voiced the worry that the Hangul may go the way of the Dodo and Woolly Mammoth, remembered only in photographs. His words strike at the heart of what is at stake: The disappearance of the Hangul would not just rob Kashmir of a proud emblem but also erase a symbol of our natural heritage.
Scientists warn that human interference during the deer’s mating and birthing seasons is raising stress levels and hurting reproduction. Poaching, deforestation, and livestock grazing add to the assault. Without urgent action, extinction is not a distant threat, it is a looming reality.
Saving Hangul is not about animals alone, it is also about the ecological stability. It is time we protect Dachigam, curb poaching, reduce livestock pressure, and create safe wildlife corridors. If we let Hangul vanish, it will not be just the extinction of fabled animal but we will also be collectively responsible for this.
At a recent international conference in Srinagar, experts from Europe and Asia joined local voices to stress what must be done: protect habitats, create corridors for gene flow, strengthen enforcement against poaching, and reduce the pressures of grazing and tourism. The roadmap exists. What is missing is urgency.
Governments move slowly, Omar Abdullah admitted, but extinction does not wait for files to move. The choice is ours: act now, or consign the Hangul to photographs. It is good that the CM has drawn attention to the imminent threat of Hangul’s extinction. This has not just brought the issue back into public consciousness but also lent a new urgency to the need to ensure that Hangul survives.
