Raimona National Park
Raimona National Park is located in the extreme western part of Assam, India. It spread across Gossaigaon and Kokrajhar subdivisions of the Kokrajhar district of BTR. The area is located along the Himalayan foothills and together with Phibsoo Wildlife Sanctuary of Bhutan and Buxa Tiger Reserve of West Bengal forms a fairly large transboundary conservation landscape of more than 2,400 km2.
The boundary of Raimona National Park is marked by the Sankosh River on the west, and Saralbhanga River on the east runs northwards till it touches the Indo-Bhutan international boundary on the north and remaining part of Ripu Reserve Forest on the south. The southern boundary runs eastwards along the fire line Ride-6 up to Pekua River.
Assam has been blessed in abundance with a great variety of flora and fauna and was home to five national parks housing a wide variety of species of plants and animals until recently before two more were added to the list – Raimona and Dehing Patkai. It was declared to be National Park on 5 June 2021 by the announcement of Assam’s Chief Minister Himanta Biswa Sarma on the occasion of World Environment Day at Gandhi Mandap, Guwahati.
Variability of life
Raimona National Park is famous for the golden langur, an endemic species (with Bhutan) which has been named as the mascot of the Bodoland region. It also has Asian elephants, Bengal tigers, clouded leopard, gaur, chital, four to five species of hornbills, more than 150 species of butterflies, 170 species of birds, 380 varieties of plants, and orchids.
Being a moist deciduous and semi-evergreen forest, this National Park is rich in biodiversity. It has four non-human primates, slow loris, Assamese macaque, Rhesus monkey, and capped langur. Other noteworthy mammals found in this national park includes Chinese pangolin, Himalayan black bear, dhole or Asian wild dog, crab-eating mongoose, leopard cat, jungle cat, Asian golden cat, leopard, Bengal tiger, clouded leopard, gaur, Asian elephant, Himalayan serow, chital, sambar, hog deer, crestless Himalayan porcupine, barking deer, and hispid hare.
Birds
Raimona forest harbors more than 260 bird species. The avifauna includes swamp francolin, critically endangered white-bellied heron, grey peacock pheasant, kaleej pheasant, Indian peafowl, lesser adjutant, Oriental darter, collared falconet, white-backed vulture, slender-billed vulture, besra, Jerdon’s baza, black baza, osprey, Bengal florican, now perhaps extirpated, ibisbill, mountain imperial pigeon, green imperial pigeon, red-breasted parakeet, great pied hornbill, wreathed hornbill, occasional rufous-necked and grey hornbills, hill myna and scaly thrush.
