Tigers in Telangana likely preyed by poachers who killed big cats in several states

Hyderabad: Tigers in Telangana that have gone missing, or have been unaccounted for over the past several years, particularly in the erstwhile Adilabad district, may have well fallen prey to a well-organised gang of poachers with evidences collected by investigating officials confirming that a key member of the gang, and some others, had visited Bellampalli in Mancherial district. During the investigations, officials also discovered some evidence that some of the gang members, or their associates, had also been to the Kawal Tiger Reserve.

A nationwide investigation into tiger poaching, which also revealed Telangana connection to the poachers, resulted in the arrest of 13 persons, while 16 more have been named in the chargesheet filed last week in the case before the Judicial Magistrate First Class in Rajoura in Maharashtra.

Among those arrested and remanded to judicial custody is Sonu Singh Bawaria, who the investigators, based on call data records, found had been to Bellampalli in Mancherial district where he, along with some other associates of his, stayed for some time. Following this, investigators also found what has been described as “indirect” evidence, that either this group, or others associated with it, had been to Kawal Tiger Reserve.

However, forest officials in Telangana said they were not aware of Sonu Singh and his accomplices coming and staying in Bellampalli, or going to the Kawal Tiger Reserve.

Incidentally, following a tip-off from their Maharashtra counterparts, forest officials from Asifabad on February 4 this year, arrested 12 persons from a train heading to Chennai. While one of the men travelling with this group escaped when the train was stopped at Kagaznagar railway station for a search and arrest operation, four men and eight women were taken into custody and a day later were produced in court.

“We collected forensic samples from all of them, and the reports have shown that five of them had remnants of tiger blood under their fingernails. All those given bail hail from Madhya Pradesh, and have been issued notices to appear before the court for a hearing that was postponed last week. If they do not appear for the next hearing, then we will seek arrest orders,” Asifabad district forest officer Neeraj Kumar Tibrewal said.

It may be recalled that the Kawal Tiger Reserve did not have any resident tiger for several years, and all the tigers present in the now KB Asifabad and Mancherial districts in the forest areas that have been declared as ‘tiger corridor’ stretches connecting tiger reserves and wildlife sanctuaries in Maharashtra and Chhattisgarh to forests in northern Telangana districts.

Some of these tigers, have in the past few months, even found their way further south in the state, into the forests of Mulugu, Bhadradri-Kothagudem, Peddapalli, and Karimnagar districts. Since the corridor forest areas lack protection as in the case of a reserve or a sanctuary, it is feared that some of the tigers that have gone missing from Asifabad and Mancherial districts and routinely claimed as returning to Maharashtra or Chhattisgarh, may have fallen prey to this gang of poachers.

The two districts are estimated to have some seven to nine tigers, but according to sources, at least six to 10 have been missing from these areas, as well as from the rest of the erstwhile Adilabad district in the past few years. These include a mother and two cubs, with the rest of this tiger family, a male and two other cubs, falling prey to poisoning in January 2024.

One of the officials closely involved with the investigation into the poaching gang and its activities in Maharashtra and Madhya Pradesh, said this group has been focusing not on tiger reserves but in tiger bearing areas, such as the corridor forests, and in areas adjacent to protected areas where people are not in favour of having tigers moving about.

Important Points

Tiger poaching gang members stayed in Belampalli in Asifabad district, also went to Kawal Tiger Reserve

Gang with members and associates from north-eastern states, believed to have poached tigers in Madhya Pradesh, Maharashtra, Tamil Nadu, Kerala, Telangana.

Suspected members of the gang caught in Kagaznagar, forensic evidence found tiger blood under nails of their hands, currently out on bail

Gang first exposed in 2023 when skin of tiger killed in Gadchiroli in Maharashtra found in Assam along with 19 kg of tiger bones from five poachers

29 named as accused in the chargesheet filed by Maharashtra forest officials, 13 including three persons from the north-east, arrested

Digital transactions of around Rs 8 crore discovered, one transaction traced to Kakinada in Andhra Pradesh