As nilgai destroy crops along India-Nepal border, farmers urge government action

Three years ago, Ram Chandra Kurmi, a farmer from the village of Gaidahawa in south-western Nepal, abandoned his small vegetable plot. The 39-year-old, who once supported his family of five through farming, now struggles to make a stable income.

The culprit, he says, is the uncontrolled proliferation of nilgais, or blue bulls (Boselaphus tragocamelus), a large antelope species native to this region. “Nilgais come at night when no one’s around to shoo them away and munch on the vegetables,” he said. “I couldn’t do anything about it, so I had to quit farming altogether.”

Kurmi’s story is echoed across the Indo-Gangetic plains that straddle the Nepal-India border region, where marginalised farming communities complain of government inaction to address the problem.

The nilgai, whose return to neighboring Bangladesh after nearly a century was celebrated there, is typically found at elevations ranging from 75 metres-300 metres (about 300 ft-1,000 ft). It’s been described as having the body of a horse and head of an antelope. Making it even more distinctive is the fact that adult males are iron-blue to light gray in color, hence the name nilgai (“blue cow”). It’s also been said to have the “appetite of a cow, the speed of a horse, and the alertness of a dog”.

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