Context: Recently, a number of conservation agencies have launched a citizen science initiative, a mobile-based application called KURMA, aimed at turtle conservation.
Key Points

• The application has been developed by the Indian Turtle Conservation Action Network (ITCAN) in collaboration with the Turtle Survival Alliance-India and Wildlife Conservation Society-India.
• This app not only provides a digital database which helps identify species but also provides the location of the nearest rescue centre for turtles across the country.
• The KURMA App serves as a digital database, with a built-in digital field guide covering 29 species of freshwater turtles and tortoises of India, and information on turtle identification, distribution, vernacular names, and threats.

Threat perception

• Tortoise and freshwater turtles are among the most trafficked in the country.
• A report released in 2019 by TRAFFIC, an international wildlife trade monitoring organisation, showed that at least 200 tortoises and freshwater turtles fall prey to illicit poaching and smuggling every week, or 11,000 each year.
• 23 of the 29 species of freshwater turtle and tortoise speciesfound in India come under the threatened category in the IUCN Red List and are under severe existential threat due to human activities.

Significance

• One of the major challenges for freshwater turtle conservation in the country is that wildlife crime prevention agencies are not sufficiently equipped to know how to distinguish one species from the other, or their protection status in accordance with CITES (Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species) and the Wildlife Protection Act. The KURMA app helps overcome this problem.
• The information of nearby rescue centres will aid timely support to the rescued animals.
• If anyone reports a turtle from any part of the country using KURMA, he or she receives advice about the species and its conservation.