10 tigers die in a month in Nilgiris: Six cubs starve to death, two poisoned
At least 10 tigers have died in the Nilgiri Biosphere Reserve in Tamil Nadu, India. Six tiger cubs starved to death, two adult tigers died due to infighting, two tigers were poisoned, and the accused has been arrested. The union environment ministry has formed a committee to investigate the deaths and proposed measures to prevent further unnatural deaths.
New Delhi: At least 10 tigers died in the Nilgiri Biosphere Reserve in Tamil Nadu between August 16 and September 19, the union environment ministry has informed Rajya Sabha.
Of these six tiger cubs starved to death and two adult tigers died due to infighting; the death of two other tigers was due to poisoning and the accused has been arrested by the forest department, union environment minister Bhupender Yadav said.
Yadav was responding to a question by Tamil Nadu MPs, Vaiko and M Shanmugam on whether it is a fact that more than 10 tigers recently died at the Nilgiris Biosphere in Tamil Nadu; if so, whether any team or committee was formed to investigate the deaths after conducting post-mortems on the tigers, including the cubs; whether the National Tiger Conservation Authority (NTCA) protocols were followed while investigating the deaths of these tigers; if so, the reasons for sudden deaths of large number of tigers; and the follow-up action proposed for the prevention of unnatural deaths.
“A committee was constituted by the NTCA to ascertain the reasons of said tiger deaths in Nilgiris. The reasons, as reported by the Committee, are given below: (i) 6 tiger cubs and two adult tigers died (cubs due to starvation and adult tigers due to infighting). (ii) The death of two tigers in Avalanche region was due to poisoning, the culprit has already been arrested by the Forest Department,” Yadav said.
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He added that “the follow-up action proposed for the prevention of unnatural deaths and to conserve and protect wild animals in the region are to implement a landscape strategy with focus on potential future conflict considering movement ecology of tiger and land-use changes in the landscape,” he said.
Yadav recommended a detailed monitoring involving M-STrIPES modules and intensive camera trapping of the region and investigate recent tiger sightings across the human dominated area, getting deeper into the situation analyses in terms of since when the tiger sightings occur, frequency and level of threat/risk perception by the people.
“I recommended we initiate consultation with concerned stakeholders to develop a micro-plan either at local level or panchayat level, so that the conflict mitigation strategies can be visualised and implemented collaboratively by the stakeholders with the guidance of forest department,” Yadav said.
