Operation Kaliyasot launched on Thursday with much fanfare to capture and shift the tiger T-1 roaming in the vicinity of the State Capital was called off abruptly on Friday noon, courtesy wildlife activist Ajay Dubey's petition in the Madhya Pradesh High Court and National Tiger Conservation Authority's (NTCA) denial to permit capture and shifting of tiger.
Wildlife activist Ajay Dubey while talking to 'The Pioneer' said, "The hearing over the shifting of tigers roaming around the city is pending before the Madhya Pradesh High Court, that has listed it for hearing on November 16, the hurry of forest officials to capture tiger by tranquilizing and shift them to other location
despite objection by the NTCA creates doubts over their intentions."
Dubey further said that the forest officials Act is unlawful and that is why they have abruptly called off the search operation mid-way as they would have to answer the court and the NTCA that why they did not even wait for the court order over the issue that was to come in just a few days.
According to forest department sources the search operation was started early in the morning at 6 am on its second day but till 2 pm neither the tiger could be traced nor its pugmarks were found. The searching team wound up the operation at this point of time in its midst as it got tired. The search operation would now be carried out on Saturday and would continue till the big cat is captured, sources added.
On Thursday also the officials and employees of the forest department looked for the striped feline in the forests of Kerwa and Kaliyasot but no traces of the big cat were found. Ten teams looked for the beast till evening in the forest but they were unsuccessful in finding the location of the tiger that is roaming in the Kerwa-Kaliyasot corridor since last six months.
Dubey also said that it is a shame for the forest department that such a huge team of over 300 personnel could not find any traces of the tiger in two days of intensive search operation.