From CK Nayak
NEW DELHI: Apart from clouds and the living root bridges, Meghalaya is also known for pitcher plants, a signature item for the hill state, whose population has, over the years, been threatened because of several practices involving trade, medicine et al.
India’s only known pitcher plant species, Nepenthes khasiana Hook, an evergreen shrub considered endemic to Meghalaya, at times gets displayed as an icon of the state so much so that there is a reserved park for this species at Baghmara in South Garo Hills district.
It is mostly distributed in West Khasi Hills, East Khasi Hills, South Garo Hills, West Garo Hills and Jaintia Hills at an altitude of about 1,000 to 1,500 metres.
Pitcher plants are carnivorous plants that attract, kill and digest insects.
Classified as endangered, the species occupies an area of 250 square kilometres, according to the IUCN Red List. Isolated subpopulations exist in the Jarain area of the Jaintia Hills and Baghmara area of the Garo Hills.
But over the past few decades, wild populations of the species have been declining due to threats from human activities, mainly mining, shifting cultivation, and excessive collection.
The unique plant is used for local medicines and even sold outside the state, reports said. Experts concurred that more than 40 per cent of the wild population had declined over the past 50 years. But there is no count of the exact number of the wild plant till date.
One of the main threats to the plants is extensive human collection.
A large proportion of N khasiana habitats, over the past few decades, have been destroyed and even the remaining populations have suffered a severe drop because of unsustainable poaching and indiscriminate collection, even by students.
Unsustainable harvests due to phenomenal increase of prescription by the local medical practitioners have also led to rapid depletion of the species in its natural habitat.
The species is also reported to be exported by local plant collectors to other states of India and has, thus, led to its further exploitation.
The fluid from unopened pitchers is used by local tribes for medicinal purposes such as in eye drops to cure cataracts and night blindness, treat stomach ailments, diabetes, skin conditions and other illnesses. Because of their ornamental value, the plants were reportedly collected to sell domestically for about 50 to 100 rupees per plant and also for export to other states.
Rampant coal and limestone mining as well as shifting or jhum cultivation in habitats of the plant have increased the patchiness of vegetation and drastically affected the regeneration of the pitcher plant. Construction of roads and urbanisation are an added threat.
Because it is at risk of extinction, the plant is included in the Negative List of Exports of the Government of India and it is a Schedule VI species under the Wildlife Protection Act, 1972. It is also listed under Appendix I of CITES (Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species of Wild Fauna and Flora), prohibiting the trade of this species.
Recent studies suggested that the colonization of Nepenthes into Southeast Asia began from the Indian subcontinent.
“The relict N khasiana, endemic to Northeast India, marks this migration to the Malay Peninsula,” explained Dr Pramod Tandon, former vice-chancellor of North-Eastern Hill University (NEHU), Shillong. Subsequent colonisation of this genus of pitcher plants started in Indo-China and the Indo-Malayan Archipelago where three major lineages can be outlined, he elaborated.
Various in-situ and ex-situ (off-site) conservation measures have been implemented by NEHU and other governmental organisations including techniques like tissue culture, micropropagation and germplasm preservation, which have been employed to preserve N khasiana.
Dr Tandon, who is a Padma Shri awardee, said the state Forest department is propagating the plants through tissue culture and reintroducing them in East Khasi Hills. “The villagers are now introducing and taking care of plants in nature,” he added. The gene pool in cultivated plants is small, thus, effective conservation and protection of their natural habitats is vital. Enforcing trade regulations and educating villagers is important, he said.
Baghmara pitcher plant sanctuary in South Garo Hills had been established to protect the plants.
In 2006, the Supreme Court directed all states to set aside an ecological sensitive zone (ESZ) as buffer areas around a specified list of national parks and sanctuaries.
The aim was to regulate certain activities in protected areas to safeguard fragile ecosystems. But 12 years later, after noticing failure to comply, an apex court in 2018 ordered an ESZ of 10 kilometres around the pitcher plant sanctuary along with 20 others in different states.