News update: The forest department issued a red alert in all tiger reserves, sanctuaries and parks in Rajasthan, after a camera click a photograph with a wire snare around the neck of tiger T-108 in Ranthambore National Park noticed on Friday. The incident shocked both wildlife officials and activists. The tiger was immediately rescued by forest staff, tranquilised and released into the forest.
The tiger broke free from the wire trap, but the metal noose that got stuck in the big cat’s neck exposed the monitoring lapse at Ranthambore National Park. In the recent past, the forest department also reported such cases of animals including cows and a buffaloes getting stuck in wire traps intentionally laid by the poachers and villagers at Ranthambore National Park.
Rajasthan’s three national parks (Ranthambore, Keoladeo and Mukundra Hills) have 69 tigers, as per the 2018 tiger census, of which 52 are in Ranthambore alone. Officials say the park has a high adult tiger population and younger tigers have been venturing afar in search of new territories, sparking human-animal conflicts. (India Today)
Ranthambore has long been a hunting ground for poachers. In April 2018, two tiger cubs there died after eating a bull suspected to have been poisoned by poachers. This April, forest staff arrested poachers found cooking the meat of a wild animal. In February, camera traps caught poachers carrying a beheaded chinkara. Forest and police officials who went to arrest the suspects were attacked by villagers with stones, leaving six members injured. Soon after, Rajsamand MP and National Tiger Conservation Authority (NTCA) member Diya Kumari demanded an inquiry into the claimed disappearance of 26 tigers from Ranthambore over a decade or so.