E-Paper
Maharashtra govt forms 6-member panel to probe killing of tigress Avni
The tigress was shot by Asghar Ali Khan, a shooter from Hyderabad in Yavatmal district after he was engaged by the forest department to eliminate the tigress that, by then, was believed to be responsible for the death of 13 villagers.
Following a rap from the Bombay High Court on the forest department’s lack of accountability, the Maharashtra government has finally constituted a six-member committee to hold those accountable in the shooting of the ‘problematic’ tigress, Avni (T1), which witnessed a national outrage a couple of years ago.
The tigress was shot by Asghar Ali Khan, a shooter from Hyderabad in Yavatmal district after he was engaged by the forest department to eliminate the tigress that, by then, was believed to be responsible for the death of 13 villagers.
Responding to a PIL, the Nagpur bench of the Bombay High Court had criticised the forest department for negligence in fixing accountability of officers who, prima facie, did not perform their duty properly during the shooting of the tigress.
The state committee will be headed by senior IFS officer Vikas Gupta, an additional principal chief conservator of forests, while DFO Shatanik Bhagwat will be a member-secretary. Other members include Yavatmal deputy SP, director of Regional Forensic Laboratory, Nagpur, Tushar Bawne, assistant commissioner (animal husbandry), and JP Patil, law and judiciary department. It is the third committee to probe tigress Avni’s killing.
Earlier, Justice Sunil Shukre and Justice Avinash Gharote, who studied the inquiry reports of the National Tiger Conservation Authority (NTCA) and state committee, apparently found that there had been several gaps in the investigation, especially on the part of the state government during a hearing the PIL in January. The high court had also observed that there were some officers from the forest department who, prima facie, have not performed their duty, and the department made no inquiry into their negligence to fix accountability. The court had also said there was a lack of clarity in the orders issued by the chief wildlife warden and chief conservator of forest (CCF), Yavatmal, regarding the specific role, responsibility and authority delegated.
The reports state that there was a lack of transparency in assigning the execution of the operation to Pandharkawda deputy conservator in Yavatmal district, which was a major reason for the operational and other errors in decision-making regarding the execution of the order to capture T1 alive or dead.
During the period, the then union minister and BJP leader Maneka Gandhi also criticised the killing of Avni. However, the then Maharashtra forest minister Sudhir Mungantiwar and union minister for transport Nitin Gadkari defended the killing of the tigress after dubbing it as a man-eater.
