Forest officials suspect rescued Bandipur tiger fatally attacked farmer in October

Mysuru: Forest officials are suspecting that the tiger rescued on Saturday could be the same one which killed a farmer on October 31 too. However, the Tigress which attacked and killed a farmer on October 26 is still elusive. 

Team of personnel of Forest department rescued 11 to 12 year old male tiger at Moleyur wildlife range of Bandipur Tiger Reserve on Saturday late night. 

This tiger was the one which had killed farmer Chowda Naika (35) at Hale Heggudilu village on Friday morning. 

So far two tigers and four cubs including one male Tiger; one female Tiger and its two cubs; two cubs of a Tigress are rescued from October 16. 

Speaking of Saturday's operation APCCF WildLife, Kumar Pushkar said, "It is a great rescue operation carried out by Forest department personnel and Veterinarians. As per preliminary observation, the tiger was snared, leading to severe injury on the neck, which made it attack human, as it could not hunt wild prey."

Officials said that, they have confirmed that it was the same tiger which killed a farmer on Friday, with its movement from its pug marks from the place of incident, to the place where it has been rescued now. This tiger is captured at a distance of 2km from the spot where the farmer was killed.

Officials added that they had measured the depth of wound of two upper and two lower canine bites of tiger on Chowda Naika's body. The depth of the right upper canine was lesser indicating it was fragile. The right upper canine teeth of tiger rescued now has been fragile due to aging. When a Tiger bites a man, human DNA can be traced in feces and blood. They had found and collected the hair of  the Tiger on the body of Chowda Naika. Now they have collected the hair and blood of this Tiger and sent them for DNA analysis for scientific confirmation that it was the same Tiger which killed the farmer on Friday morning," they said. 

About operation, officials explained, this tiger had killed a dog on Saturday morning and farmers had even demanded compensation for death of this dog too. Tiger was found in Elephant proof trench at 4.30pm on Saturday evening. Injury at its neck due to snare was noticed. It moved inside forest by 6.30pm. It was dark, they used torch of drone. Yet it was not clearly seen. It had to be darted on hand or shoulder else it could harm Tiger. So operation was stopped by 10pm. Later it was found again by 11pm and Dr Ramesh darted it by 11.07pm. Its wound in the neck was dressed and moved to a cage and shifted to Chamundi rescue centre at Koorgalli by 2am. 

Elephants Mahendra, Bheema and Srikanta from Matthigodu Elephant camp of Nagarahole Tiger Reserve, Lakshmana from Harangi camp of Kodagu wild life division were part of the Operation. Bandipur  director S Prabhakaran, Wildlife veterinarians Dr Ramesh, Dr Wasim, sharp shooter Ranjan and others led the team. 

Suspected to be same which killed farmer on Oct 31: 

Officials are suspecting that it might be the same tiger which killed another farmer Doddaningaiah (53) on October 31, going by the proximity of the place where farmer was killed and the place from which this Tiger has been rescued now. They are collecting information of autopsy of the farmer to measure the depth of the wound of canine bites of Tiger, in order to confirm it. 

Operation on: 

However, even as the farmers in Sargur taluk are enraged, in order to prevent further attacks the operations are continued. 

The Tigress which had killed farmer Rajashekar (65) on October 26 is still elusive. Its two cubs are already rescued. Combing operation is on. 

Another operation is on to rescue one cub of a Tigress which attacked and injured farmer Madegowda, 43 on October 16. They have already rescued this Tigress, and its two cubs earlier.