Centre alerts reserves after tiger’s skin seized in Assam

Guwahati/Nagpur: With several tiger reserves in the country on the radar of organized gangs of Bawaria poachers from Haryana, the Wildlife Crime Control Bureau (WCCB), a statutory body under the ministry of environment, forest and climate change (MoEFCC), has issued a red alert.WCCB sources said the immediate trigger to sound an alert was the seizure of a nine-foot-long tiger skin and around 18kg bones from four accused in Guwahati, Assam, on June 28. The skin is suspected to be from the Chandrapur landscape.The tiger reserves and their adjoining forest areas on the radar include Tadoba (Maharashtra), Satpura (MP), Corbett and Rajaji (Uttarakhand), Pench (MP & Maharashtra), Amangarh and Pilibhit (UP), and Valmiki (Bihar). Tiger-bearing forest pockets in Gadchiroli, Chandrapur, and Balaghat have also been put on alert.The alert issued by HV Girisha, additional director of WCCB, has asked all the field directors of tiger reserves and territorial areas adjoining them to intensify patrolling based on credible inputs about organized gangs becoming active, and revelations from tiger body parts seizures.The accused included two women. The accused have been identified as Ramu Das (40) from Samalkha in Panipat, and Om Prakash (45), Maya Devi, and Rajwati, all from Pinjore in Haryana. The tiger skin was to be smuggled to Myanmar through a trader from Shillong in Meghalaya.Acting on intelligence from a wildlife NGO, Guwahati police nabbed the culprits from a rented house in Dharapur (Majali) on Wednesday night. The skin is feared to be from Chandrapur district, though confirmation and verification is being done by the WCCB.Maharashtra PCCF (wildlife) Maheep Gupta denied that the skin and body parts were from Chandrapur. “I have spoken to WCCB officials, and they said the material is from UP,” said Gupta.However, Keshav Kumar, ex-IPS officer and consultant to the Assam home department, who guided the police in seizure, has said that the tiger was killed about a month back possibly in a Maharashtra forest.“We have verified the skin with the database of Tadoba but it doesn’t match. We are in touch with WII, which has database of the entire landscape. Being a weekend, the verification work will be done on Monday. It is for sure that the skin is not from UP. We are also matching the stripes with tigers from Satpura reserve in MP,” said WCCB officials on condition of anonymity.Even if Gupta is in denial mode, the call detail records (CDRs) with police reveal a Maharashtra connection to poaching. The tiger is feared to have been hunted from somewhere in Bramhapuri division in Chandrapur, said sources.
Stay updated with the latest news on Times of India. Don't miss daily games like Crossword, Sudoku, and Mini Crossword.