Tranquilizing Sundari: Expert Team From Similipal Leaves For Satkosia

Bhubaneswar: An expert team from Similipal National Park in Mayurbhanj district left for Satkosia on Monday to tranqualize Royal Bengal Tigress Sundari, which has been in the eye of the storm raging in the sanctuary area in Angul district after the death of an elderly man the previous day.

It will assist another team, comprising experts from Bhubaneswar-based College of Veterinary Science and Animal Husbandry of the Odisha University of Agriculture Technology (OUAT), Nandankanan Zoological Park and Gun Assistants and Wildlife Institute of India (WII), Dehradun, which reached Angul on Sunday night.

However, the team is yet to proceed to Satkosia Wildlife Sanctuary due to the prevailing tension in Tainsi village, reports said.

The Forest department is also waiting for a go ahead from the state administration to tranquilize the tigress.

Talking to mediapersons here on Monday, Principal Chief Conservator of Forest (PCCF), Wildlife, Sandip Tripathy informed that the tigress, once tranquilized, would be kept inside an enclosure at Raiguda inside Satkosia Tiger Reserve (STR). It is the same enclosure where she was kept after being brought from Bandhavgarh National Park in Madhya Pradesh on June 28.

“We have written a letter to the National Tiger Conservation Authority (NTCA) and the Wildlife Institute of India (WII) about the next course of action after the tigress is released into the enclosure,” he said.

Tripathy said that the first priority of the Forest Department was to tranquilize the tigress and provide protection to the villagers living inside the sanctuary. “We have requested the villagers to allow the expert teams to tranquilize the tigress at the earliest,” he added.

Meanwhile, protesting against the release of the Bengal tigress into the wild, BJD MLA of Athmallik, Sanjib Sahu told the media on Monday that the tigress had been creating panic among the people in and outside the sanctuary after killing two persons and a number of cattle. “I have requested the Chief Minister and the Centre to make necessary arrangement for immediate relocation of the tigress,” he added.

A state BJP delegation also met Angul collector this afternoon and submitted a memorandum, demanding immediate shifting of the tigress.