Bhubaneswar: Nandan, the 17-year-old Royal Bengal Tiger of Odisha’s Nandankanan Zoological Park, succumbed to prolonged illness on Saturday.
According to sources, Nandan was suffering from arthritis in the waist and was unable to walk. He was shifted to the zoo’s veterinary hospital in February and was being looked after by veterinary orthopaedic specialists.
The tiger had sneaked into the zoo in 2013 from the Chandaka sanctuary probably in search of a mate, zoo officials said.
Nandan mated tigress Megha in the zoo and fathered two cubs in 2016 and three in 2021.
Last month, the zoo hand lost a 14-year-old white tigress Sneha. Officials believed that besides old age, intense heat wave conditions could have been the reason for her sudden illness and death.
In October 2022, the zoo had lost another 11-year-old white tigress Bijaya, who succumbed to a cancerous growth in her lungs. Prior to that in October 2019, a five-year-old white male tiger named Subhranshu had died due to liver-related ailments.
