Authorities have sent out a team of elephants to hunt for a killer tiger after five people died in a string of gruesome attacks.
Locals in Khairatiya, India vented their fury at forest rangers after Nagendra Singh, 33, became the village’s latest victim of violent big cats last Thursday (June 23).
He had gone to collect grass in a cane field when he was pounced on by the animal — reported to be a female tigress — and was savaged in front of shocked onlookers.
Describing how villagers fought to save him from the attack, Khairatiya village head Pargat Singh told the Hindustan Times: “The tigress pounced on Suraj, and he was killed in a matter of seconds. It all happened too fast.
“By the time we managed to gather locals and shove the tigress away, the victim’s windpipe had been snapped, and he died on spot”
Today (June 28), a forest department official confirmed that one tigress had been caught by a trap laid out in the forest the night before, eliminating one of the two suspected rogue animals thought to be behind the killings.
Sub divisional officer Amit Kumar said that after being caught and tranquilised she was taken to Katarniaghat Wildlife Sanctuary, with a final decision on her welfare to be made by authorities over the coming days.
Over the weekend forest rangers riding on the back of elephants had been sent out to try and spot the tigers in the wild. Drones and surveillance cameras had also been used to keep track of their movements.
Khairatiya is located near to the Dudhwa forest on the border with Nepal, which is home to a tiger reserve.
The tiger attacks had become a hot-button issue in the remote community, with one resident claiming as many as twenty people have been either injured or killed as a result of the encounters in the last year.
This article by Benedict Tetzlaff-Deas was first published by The Daily Star on 28 June 2022. Lead Image: A 33-year-old man became an Indian village’s fifth victim of brutal tiger attacks last week (Stock) (Image: Getty Images).
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