Bhopal: Two more tigers have died at Kanha Tiger Reserve taking the death toll of big cats in the State to 20 in past few months. The latest death was reported at a time when the State government, National Tiger Conservation Authority (NTCA) and the Wildlife Board are investigating the felines’ deaths. Field Director of Kanha Reserve JS Chauhan informed that a tiger and a tigress have died in the Kanha National Park. The carcass of the 14-year-old tiger was found in Supkar range of the park on April 16. It died of starvation as it was unable to hunt due to advanced age, a common occurrence in the big cat family, he claimed.
Chauhan further said that the tigress was found dead in Mukki range of KTR on Monday. It died after sustaining injuries to its head in a fight with a tiger. It appears that the tigress and its cub went for a kill and were attacked by another tiger, he added. With these two deaths, 20 tigers have died in State’s forests in the last 12 months. Some of them were killed by poachers. A tigress and its two cubs were poisoned to death in the core area of Pench Tiger Reserve (PTR) on March 28. Four poachers were arrested in this case.
A two-member team of NTCA had visited PTR earlier this month. The team of Inspector General of Forest– NTCA Nagpur D Swain and Assistant Director of Wildlife Crime Control Bureau- Jabalpur AR Choudhary is expected to visit other tiger reserves and places where big cat deaths have been reported.
