BPSC 71st CCE Prelims General Studies · Question 114 of 150

Correct — A, Valmiki National Park. Valmiki, in the West Champaran district of Bihar on the Nepal border, is the only protected area in the State ever notified under Project Tiger — and it is also Bihar's only national park, so a single site carries both distinctions. The sequence is worth learning whole: declared a wildlife sanctuary in 1978, brought under Project Tiger in 1989–90 as India's 18th tiger reserve, notified a national park in 1990, and re-notified as a tiger reserve in 2012 when core and buffer were formally demarcated. The reserve runs to 899.38 sq km — 598.45 sq km of core critical tiger habitat plus 300.93 sq km of buffer — while the national park and sanctuary complex itself is put at 898.45 sq km. The 2022 All India Tiger Estimation counted 54 tigers inside it, which makes Valmiki one of the clearer recoveries outside the classic tiger States. Geographically it occupies the Someshwar and Dun hill tract of the Gandak basin: the Gandak forms its western boundary, at Valmikinagar the rivulets Sonha and Pachnad join it at the confluence called Triveni, and the Harha–Masan system rising in these forests becomes the Burhi Gandak further south. Seven Champion and Seth forest types have been mapped inside it, from Bhabar–Dun sal forest to eastern wet alluvial grassland, with an isolated chir pine patch in the Raghia block, and 241 bird species have been recorded. Crucially it is contiguous with Nepal's Chitwan National Park, so the two form one trans-boundary tiger landscape. Options (b) and (c) name real Bihar protected areas — but both are wildlife sanctuaries outside Project Tiger, and that distinction is the entire question.

• (b)Udaypur Wildlife Sanctuary — A genuine Bihar sanctuary, and the cruellest option here because it sits in the very same district as Valmiki — West Champaran — so 'it is in the right part of Bihar' proves nothing. Established in 1978, it covers only 8.74 sq km around Udaypur Lake, a wetland of about 319 hectares, which became a Ramsar site on 25 September 2025 — after this exam. It is a waterbird sanctuary with no Project Tiger notification.
• (c)Bhimbandh Wildlife Sanctuary — Bihar's largest sanctuary by forest area — about 682 sq km in Munger district, established 1976, on the Kharagpur Hills at the northern edge of the Chota Nagpur plateau, best known for the hot springs at Bhimbandh, Sita Kund and Rishi Kund. Its sheer size persuades candidates it must be the tiger reserve, but size is not the test; an NTCA-recommended notification is, and Bhimbandh has never had one.
• (d)None of these — Tempting only if you believe Bihar has no tiger reserve at all — a common assumption, because Bihar's recorded forest area is just 7,442 sq km, 7.90% of its geographical area, among the lowest shares in India. But scarcity of forest is not absence of a reserve. Bihar has exactly one, it holds 54 tigers, and option (a) names it.

Project Tiger was launched in April 1973 with nine reserves — Bandipur, Corbett, Kanha, Manas, Melghat, Palamau, Ranthambore, Similipal and Sunderbans — as a centrally sponsored scheme, not a statutory one. It acquired legal teeth only through the 2006 amendment to the Wildlife (Protection) Act, 1972, which made the National Tiger Conservation Authority a statutory body and laid down how a tiger reserve is created. A State government issues the notification on the NTCA's recommendation. Inside it, the core or critical tiger habitat is identified on scientific and objective criteria and is to be kept inviolate for tiger conservation, without prejudice to the rights of Scheduled Tribes and other traditional forest dwellers; around that core a buffer zone is managed for coexistence, where the aim is a livelihood-compatible balance rather than exclusion. That two-zone architecture is why every tiger reserve is quoted as two numbers, and it is why Valmiki reads 598.45 core plus 300.93 buffer. Note the ladder carefully, because it is what the question turns on: a wildlife sanctuary or a national park is a notification under the 1972 Act made by the State, while a tiger reserve is an additional overlay created under the 2006 amendment. Bhimbandh and Udaypur have the first. Only Valmiki has the second.

The discriminator is legal status — not fame, not size, not district. Work it in three moves. First, remember that Bihar has exactly one national park and that it is the same site as its one tiger reserve; so the moment an option in a Bihar list reads 'National Park', that option is Valmiki and the question is effectively over. Second, refuse the two decoys the paper builds in. District is a decoy, because Udaypur Wildlife Sanctuary is in West Champaran, the same district as Valmiki. Size is a decoy too: Bhimbandh's roughly 682 sq km is comparable to Valmiki's 598 sq km core, but Project Tiger status flows from a notification, not from an area threshold — Ranthambore's core is 1,113.36 sq km and Palamau's only 414.08 sq km, and both are tiger reserves. Third, see what option (d) preys on. Bihar is a forest-poor State and candidates generalise from that to 'Bihar cannot have a tiger reserve'. The generalisation is false, and catching it is the whole purpose of the question. If you retain one line, retain this: Valmiki is Bihar's only national park, Bihar's only tiger reserve, and India's 18th.

• Valmiki, in West Champaran district, is Bihar's only national park and only tiger reserve; it was brought under Project Tiger in 1989–90 as India's 18th tiger reserve and re-notified in 2012.
• It was declared a wildlife sanctuary in 1978 and a national park in 1990; the reserve totals 899.38 sq km — core 598.45 sq km plus buffer 300.93 sq km — and the park itself is put at 898.45 sq km.
• The 2022 All India Tiger Estimation recorded 54 tigers at Valmiki; the reserve is contiguous with Nepal's Chitwan National Park, forming a single trans-boundary tiger landscape across the international border.
• Bhimbandh Wildlife Sanctuary (Munger district, 1976, about 682 sq km, hot springs at Bhimbandh, Sita Kund and Rishi Kund) and Udaypur Wildlife Sanctuary (West Champaran, 1978, 8.74 sq km; its lake became a Ramsar site on 25 September 2025, after this exam) are sanctuaries only.
• The Gandak forms Valmiki's western boundary; at Valmikinagar the Sonha and Pachnad rivulets join it at the Triveni confluence, the Harha–Masan system rising here becomes the Burhi Gandak, and 241 bird species and seven Champion & Seth forest types have been recorded inside the reserve.
• Bihar is a forest-poor State — 7,442 sq km of recorded forest, only 7.90% of its geographical area — which is why candidates wrongly assume it can have no tiger reserve; size is no test of status, since Ranthambore's core is 1,113.36 sq km and Palamau's only 414.08 sq km.

• Choosing Bhimbandh because it is large — area does not confer Project Tiger status; only an NTCA-recommended State notification does
• Choosing Udaypur because it shares West Champaran district with Valmiki — the district is a decoy, the legal category is the test
• Choosing 'None of these' on the assumption that forest-poor Bihar has no tiger reserve — it has one, with 54 tigers in the 2022 estimation

BPSC asks Bihar's protected areas as direct one-fact recall and returns to Valmiki almost every cycle, sometimes as 'Bihar's only national park', sometimes as here through Project Tiger status. UPSC never asks a single-State list; it stacks three or four protected areas from across India and asks which are declared tiger reserves, or which has the largest critical tiger habitat, so it tests the national network rather than the State's.

• practice — not a real PYQ

  Valmiki Tiger Reserve, the only tiger reserve of Bihar, is located in which district ?

  • (a)Munger
  • (b)Jamui
  • (c)West Champaran
  • (d)Kaimur

  Answer(c) West Champaran — Valmiki lies on the Nepal border in West Champaran; Munger has Bhimbandh Wildlife Sanctuary and Jamui has the Nagi and Nakti bird sanctuaries.

• practice — not a real PYQ

  Valmiki Tiger Reserve of Bihar is contiguous with which national park of Nepal ?

  • (a)Sagarmatha National Park
  • (b)Chitwan National Park
  • (c)Langtang National Park
  • (d)Bardia National Park

  Answer(b) Chitwan National Park — Valmiki adjoins Chitwan across the border, so the two are managed as one trans-boundary tiger landscape; Sagarmatha and Langtang are high-Himalayan parks.