Assam Chief Minister Himanta Biswa Sarma has said the state will ask the Centre to cut the eco-sensitive zone around Kaziranga National Park and Tiger Reserve from its current default of 10 kilometres down to 1 kilometre. The announcement, made during a visit to Bokakhat on August 8, has reopened a familiar argument in Assam: how much land around one of India's most important wildlife habitats should stay under protective regulation, and how much should be opened up for roads, stadiums and other development.
This is, as of now, only a proposal. It has not been submitted to the central government, no draft notification exists, and no final decision has been made. Here is what is actually on the table, and what a smaller buffer could mean for Kaziranga's wildlife.
Is This a Final Decision or Just a Proposal?
It is important to be precise about where things stand. Sarma said the state government would send a formal proposal to the Union Environment Ministry within about two months. As of this report, that proposal has not been submitted.
Kaziranga has never had a final, site-specific eco-sensitive zone notified by the Centre. In the absence of one, a 2022 Supreme Court order requires a default buffer of 10 kilometres around the park to apply until a smaller, scientifically justified zone is formally notified. The Gauhati High Court reaffirmed this default position as recently as March 2026.
If Assam does submit a proposal, it would then go to the Union Ministry of Environment, Forest and Climate Change for examination. A draft notification would typically follow, opening a window for the public and conservation groups to file objections before any final notification is issued. That process has not yet begun. In short, the 1-km figure is currently a stated intention from the state government, not an approved boundary.
What Is an Eco-Sensitive Zone, and Why Does It Matter?
An eco-sensitive zone, or ESZ, is a buffer area notified around a national park, wildlife sanctuary or tiger reserve to regulate activities that could harm the ecology of the protected area. It is not a second layer of the park itself, and it does not ban all human activity. Depending on the specific notification, some activities are prohibited, others are regulated and require clearance, and many ordinary activities are allowed to continue with fewer restrictions than inside the park.
The purpose of an ESZ is to act as a transition zone, cushioning the core protected area from the direct impact of construction, industry, mining and unplanned urban growth immediately outside its boundary. A wider ESZ generally means a larger area where such activities face scrutiny; a narrower one means that scrutiny kicks in closer to the park's edge, leaving more land outside regulatory oversight.
For Kaziranga, the difference between a 10-km and a 1-km buffer is significant in scale. A 1-km zone would still cover the park's immediate periphery, but it would remove a much larger surrounding area, including parts of the landscape wildlife uses seasonally, from the same level of regulatory attention.
The Assam Government's Reasoning
The state government's argument centres on the fact that the 10-km default was never designed specifically for Kaziranga's terrain or development needs. It was applied automatically because no site-specific ESZ has been notified. Sarma has said this has held back development projects in and around Bokakhat, including a proposed stadium and other civic infrastructure, and that a "scientifically defined" 1-km zone would allow such projects to proceed while still protecting the park.
This is a legitimate governance question. Areas within 10 km of Kaziranga include parts of Bokakhat town and other settlements where residents and local authorities have long complained about restrictions on construction, business activity and public projects. The state's position is that formally notifying a smaller, better-defined zone would create clarity, rather than leaving an unusually large area under a blanket default rule indefinitely.
Possible Impact on Elephants, Rhinos, Tigers and Other Wildlife
Kaziranga is home to the world's largest population of the greater one-horned rhinoceros, with the most recent official census in 2022 recording 2,613 rhinos in the park, the highest count on record. It also supports a substantial population of wild Asiatic elephants, one of the highest densities of tigers anywhere in India, and the world's largest population of wild water buffalo, along with swamp deer and numerous other species.
A key factor conservationists point to is Kaziranga's location on the floodplain of the Brahmaputra. Every monsoon, rising water submerges large parts of the park's core grasslands, forcing elephants, rhinos, tigers, deer and other animals to move out of the park toward higher ground in the surrounding landscape, including areas well beyond the park's official boundary. In some years, this seasonal displacement has come at a heavy cost: floods killed more than 130 animals in the park in 2024, including at least six rhinos, and a similar 2017 flood, combined with vehicle collisions during animal movement, killed more than 350 animals.
If the ESZ is reduced to 1 km, much of the land that currently falls under the 10-km buffer, including areas animals use during these flood-driven movements, would no longer be covered by the same regulatory scrutiny. That does not automatically mean this land would be built over, since other protections and land-use rules can still apply. But conservationists argue it would remove an added layer of oversight over construction and land-use change precisely in the areas wildlife depends on when the park itself is underwater.
Wildlife Corridors, Habitat Connectivity and Human-Wildlife Conflict
Assam has officially identified nine wildlife corridors linking the Karbi Anglong Hills to Kaziranga, corridors that extend well beyond a single kilometre from the park boundary. These corridors are used by elephants and other wide-ranging species moving between the park and adjoining hill forests, particularly during floods.
A 2020 landscape study led by WWF India researchers found that forest cover across these corridor complexes fell from 1,176.69 square kilometres in 2002 to 748.28 square kilometres in 2013, a decline that has left wildlife with fewer patches of secure habitat outside the park. Encroachment, agricultural expansion and infrastructure have all been cited as drivers of this loss in various assessments of the landscape.
The Assam government has, at the same time, invested in efforts to ease human-wildlife conflict along this same corridor network. Earlier this year, Prime Minister Narendra Modi inaugurated an elevated wildlife corridor along the highway bordering Kaziranga's core zone, part of a roughly ₹6,950-crore project intended to let animals cross the highway safely instead of risking collisions with traffic. Notably, that project itself required diverting about 20 hectares of core zone land and 365 hectares of eco-sensitive zone land, illustrating that development and conservation infrastructure can both draw on the same protected buffer.
Kaziranga's buffer land has faced other pressures in recent years as well. In June 2025, Assam withdrew a proposal to add roughly 2,570 hectares in Sonitpur district to the park, an addition that would have extended Kaziranga's boundary toward Nameri Tiger Reserve and closed a known gap in habitat connectivity; the government cited the presence of households on the land as the reason. A proposed luxury hotel project near the park at Inglay Pathar, on land long cultivated by Adivasi tea-tribe families, has also drawn opposition from local activists, one of whom was arrested in July 2026 and later detained under the National Security Act after being granted bail. Conservationists cite these episodes as evidence that pressure on Kaziranga's surrounding land is already a live issue, independent of any formal change to the ESZ.
How Conservationists Have Responded
The proposal has drawn criticism from wildlife experts and environmental groups in Assam. Bibhab Talukdar, secretary general of the conservation organisation Aaranyak, and environmentalist Jadav Payeng have both cautioned that a narrower buffer could affect wildlife movement during floods. Golaghat-based environmental activist Apurba Ballav Goswami has said the change could pose a threat to the park's wildlife, particularly its rhinos, while Dhekiajuli-based activist Dilip Nath has argued that a 1-km zone would run against the spirit of the Supreme Court's 2022 order on ESZs. Industrialist Harsh Goenka also publicly criticised the plan on social media, pointing to the role floods play in pushing animals toward higher ground through the same corridors.
Conservationists broadly agree that a fixed distance alone does not determine whether wildlife is protected. Their concern is less about the specific number of kilometres and more about whether the areas wildlife actually depends on, including flood refuges and corridor land connecting Kaziranga to the Karbi Anglong Hills, continue to receive regulatory attention once the buffer shrinks.
What Happens Next
For the 1-km ESZ to take legal effect, several steps remain. Assam has to formally submit its site-specific proposal to the Union Environment Ministry, something Sarma has said will happen within about two months of his August 8 announcement. The ministry would then examine the proposal, and if it proceeds, issue a draft notification. That draft would be open to public comments and objections, a stage at which conservation groups, local residents and other stakeholders can formally weigh in, before any final notification is issued.
Given the scale of public interest already visible in media coverage and petitions, this process is likely to be closely watched. Until a final notification is issued, the existing 10-km default buffer remains legally in force around Kaziranga.
Conclusion
Assam's proposal to shrink Kaziranga's eco-sensitive zone from 10 km to 1 km is, at this stage, a stated intention rather than an approved change, and it has yet to go through the formal notification process that would give it legal effect. The state's case rests on removing what it calls an unscientific, blanket restriction that has held back development around Bokakhat. Conservationists counter that the land in question includes corridors and flood refuges that Kaziranga's elephants, rhinos and tigers actually use, particularly during the monsoon, and that a much smaller buffer would reduce oversight over exactly those areas. Whether the final outcome balances both concerns will depend on the scientific basis Assam presents to the Centre, and on how the public consultation process unfolds once a formal proposal is submitted.
Reader questions
Frequently asked questions
Has the Kaziranga ESZ actually been reduced to 1 km?
No. As of now, this is a proposal announced by the Assam Chief Minister. It has not been formally submitted to the Centre, and no notification has been issued. The existing 10-km default buffer remains in legal force.
Why does a 10-km eco-sensitive zone currently apply to Kaziranga?
Kaziranga has never had a final, site-specific ESZ notified. In the absence of one, a 2022 Supreme Court order requires a default 10-km buffer around protected areas until a smaller, scientifically justified zone is formally notified, a position the Gauhati High Court reaffirmed in March 2026.
How could a smaller ESZ affect Kaziranga's wildlife?
Conservationists are concerned that a 1-km buffer would remove regulatory oversight from a large surrounding area, including wildlife corridors linking Kaziranga to the Karbi Anglong Hills and land that elephants, rhinos and other animals use as flood refuges during the monsoon.
What happens next in the process?
Assam has said it will submit a formal proposal to the Union Environment Ministry within about two months. If accepted for consideration, the ministry would issue a draft notification, opening a period for public and conservationist objections before any final decision is made.
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