June 30, 2003: The day conservation policy could have changed

Usually, the Union ministry of environment and forests (MoEF) does manage to stick to its guns in the face of adversity, or even rationality. But June 30, 2003 has changed all that. In a media statement, the director general of forests declared that the MoEF would soon allow captive breeding of wild animals for medicinal purposes. The statement -- from an official on the verge of retirement -- came literally out of the blue...