The stray tigress of Moradabad suffers from some form of disability which has turned her into a maneater. The Chief Conservator Bareilly MP Singh under whose jurisdiction the entire tiger operations areas lies while talking to "The Pioneer" on Tuesday said that they suspect that the tiger is inflicted with a form of disability whether in the leg or in the jaw. He said that this was being inferred from the fact that she was not going in for a natural prey. The senior forest official said that the tigress has been able to dodge the various forest teams that have been pursuing it and is now playing the cat and the mouse game which the maneaters are adept at.
The stray tigress that has been on the move since the past three months has made ten killings and easily escaped the forest staff which have been sent to pursue it by moving in the dense corridors between the two states of Uttar Pradesh and Uttrakhand. "The tigress has some form of disability which may either be in the limb or in the jaw which has made it a maneater. We cannot say it for surety until we see the tigress but it is because of this disability that the feline has been preying upon the victims" said Singh. Regarding the shooters being unable to track the tigress, the forest official said that the beast has already begun the cat and the mouse game which the maneater usually induldges in. " A maneater is a very clever animal and knows how to dodge the shooters and also the thick density forest where a man will find it difficult to move ,goes in the favour of the tigerss" said
Singh He said that there were three shooters which had been put to the task of shooting the tigress which include Ashish Das Gupta, Sanjay Singh and Said Bin Asif. " The terrain runs in favour of the tigress since tigers are normally nocturnal animal and the tigress hiding between the thick forest is not easy to catch" he added. The Chief Conservator Forest said that they had felt strongly that the killing in the Kalagarh area on Feburary 9 was by the same female tigress even though the Uttrakhand officials were claiming the opposite. "They are saying that it is a male tiger which has made the kill but we feel that it the work of the same tigress" he said.
Meanwhile experts feel that not enough is being done to capture the tigress. Former Field Director Dudhwa GC Mishra while talking to "The Pioneer" said that the forest department is not pursuing the case with consistent efforts. " It takes time to get hold on a maneater but the efforts have to be made consistently however in this case the efforts see a lull once there is a gap between the killings as the officials get relaxed" said Mishra.
Kaushlendra Mishra a wildlife activist on his part feels that the forest department has never made the vigorous effort of trying to find out why the problem of started in the first place." There are several reasons why the tigers start straying outside and one has to take it seriously. There could be issues like disappearing prey base which is the reason for the tigers were straying in Uttar Pradesh.
However it is difficult to say why this tigress has strayed from its area because the Corbett has a rich prey base. In Uttar Pradesh though efforts should be made for the electric fencing of the areas to prevent the tiger from straying" he said.