Even as 13 countries agreed to double the number of tigers by 2022, another tiger carcass was found in Maharashtra, 18 months after it was allegedly killed to smuggle its body parts.
The body of the animal was recovered on Thursday morning from a drain in Tadoba Andhari Tiger Reserve in Chandrapur district of Maharashtra. Shalik Gedam was arrested last week in connection to the killing of the animal.
At least, four tiger deaths have been reported in the last fortnight from different parts of India, highlighting the vulnerability of the animal to changing geo-dynamics. The Tadoba case shows that poaching the animal is still easy in many tiger reserves.
The tiger deaths also indicate the task that the Global Tiger Initiative has entrusted on countries at St. Petersburg is not an easy one.
"Over 50% of the target will have to be achieved by India which has 1,411 tigers of the total 3,000 in the world," said an environment ministry official.
The task, as identified by the initiative itself, is tough on several counts ranging from tiger-human conflict, relocation of six lakh people from the reserves to deteriorating quality of habitats around the tiger reserves.
{{/usCountry}}The task, as identified by the initiative itself, is tough on several counts ranging from tiger-human conflict, relocation of six lakh people from the reserves to deteriorating quality of habitats around the tiger reserves.
{{/usCountry}}