Cricketer Rohit Sharma pledges support to conservation of rhinos: WWF India

Indian cricketer Rohit Sharma has pledged his support to WWF India's conservation efforts for rhinos, now found only in select pockets in India and Nepal with their numbers dwindling to just around 3,500, the wildlife body said Friday.

In a statement, WWF India said globally, Sharma will join several other celebrities supporting its conservation activities.

Sharma is the current captain of the Indian men's cricket team for the ongoing Asia Cup 2018.

In India, he will join Bollywood stars such as Amitabh Bachchan, Aamir Khan and Vidya Balan, and fellow cricketer Shikhar Dhawan, who have supported the body's work in the past, it said.

"Rohit Sharma, renowned Indian cricketer and the current captain of the Indian men's cricket team for the ongoing Asia Cup, has pledged his support to WWF-India's rhino conservation efforts in the country," according to the statement.

The announcement was made on the eve of World Rhino Day, it said.

WWF-India has been working on rhino conservation for over four decades and has been instrumental in protecting the greater one-horned rhino or the Indian rhino.

"Once found all along the Indo-Gangetic-Brahmaputra valley, the Indian rhino is now only found in select pockets in India and Nepal, with only about 3,500 of them left in both the countries.

"This is a result of excessive poaching for their horn and the expansion of human settlements and change in land use patterns, leading to a loss of rhino habitats," WWF India said.

Sharma, according to the statement, said, "My love for rhinos sparked when I first heard about Sudan, the last male northern white African rhino who passed away this year, thus leading to the inevitable extinction of the entire species and that broke my heart."