A 45-year-old farmer was allegedly killed by a tiger near Valmikinagar in Bihar’s West Champaran district on Saturday, triggering violent protests in which an angry mob attacked forest personnel and a policeman and damaged a forest department vehicle, officials said.
This is the third human casualty linked to man-animal conflict in the district in recent weeks.
Valmikinagar forest range officer Satyam Kumar said the victim, identified as Vijay Haldar, 45, a resident of Bangali Tola near Bherihari village under Valmikinagar police station, had gone to an agricultural field adjoining the forest area of Valmiki Tiger Reserve (VTR) when a tiger pounced on him, killing him on the spot.
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“Soon after the incident, a team of forest personnel reached the spot and recovered the body,” the range officer said, describing the incident as a result of the victim ignoring warnings issued by the forest department.
Soon after news of the farmer’s death spread, Bherihari Chowk turned into a scene of chaos as a large number of villagers gathered and blocked the Valmikinagar-Madanpur state highway, placing the body on the road in reaction to the recurring man-animal conflicts in the Valmiki Tiger Reserve (VTR). Tension mounted further as forest personnel and a police team arrived at the spot. However, what began as angry protest degenerated into mob violence after agitated villagers confronted the forest personnel and chased them amid shouts and commotion.
{{/usCountry}}Soon after news of the farmer’s death spread, Bherihari Chowk turned into a scene of chaos as a large number of villagers gathered and blocked the Valmikinagar-Madanpur state highway, placing the body on the road in reaction to the recurring man-animal conflicts in the Valmiki Tiger Reserve (VTR). Tension mounted further as forest personnel and a police team arrived at the spot. However, what began as angry protest degenerated into mob violence after agitated villagers confronted the forest personnel and chased them amid shouts and commotion.
{{/usCountry}}Video footage emerging from the spot showed the crowd chasing the forest personnel, with some villagers allegedly assaulting them. Forester Ashish Kumar and vanrakshi Kundan Kumar, besides a policeman were injured in the melee. For 20-minutes, the mob ran amok and targeted a forest department vehicle, overturning it and causing extensive damage. Normalcy returned only after Bagaha sub-divisional magistrate (SDM) Chandani Kumari and SDPO Bhushan Nihar reached the spot with reinforcements and prevailed over the situation.
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Rising human-animal conflict
This is the latest incident adding to a growing list of man-animal conflict cases reported from the VTR in recent weeks.
While a 45-year-old woman, Umarawati Devi (45), wife of Ramayan Choudhary, was killed by a tiger near Naurangiys on July 31, an elderly farmer, Aklu Yadav, 60, succumbed to his injuried a day after he was attacked by a tiger near Madanpur on July 30. The recurring man-animal conflict in the reserve is not limited to tigers. In separate incidents in the Madanpur forest range, a crocodile claimed the life of a farmer and left a woman seriously injured recently, underscoring the growing threat posed by wildlife to people living along the forest fringes.
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VTR’s field director Gaurav Ojha attributed the man-animal conflict to the ongoing monsoon season. “Animals are on move due to water logging in a few pockets. We have been frequently alerting the villagers through miking and asking them to avoid moving towards forests or move in group, if required,” said Ojha.