Mysuru: The Nagarahole National Park Tiger, which had killed three people since last one month in H D Kote taluk of Mysore district, was tranqualised and captured by the Forest Department officials at Macchur forest range on Friday bringing a big relief to people, who were living in panic on the fringes of the forests.
The male tiger, aged about 8, looked a little weak, injured on the both front and back legs.
The combing operation was launched earlier in the day and the officials were hopeful of tracking down the tiger as they had spotted its pug marks near the very place where the body of Khaddi,who killed yesterday was found.
It was suspected that the tiger was preying on human beings due to its inability to hunt because of old age or injury.PCCF Jayaram, APCCF B P Ravikumar, Narayanaswamy, CF Mysuru Siddaramppa Dr Umeshaknar, Dr Majub and Tanquilise specialist Akram Pasha were leading the operation along with as many as one hundred persons. The operation was conducted in three different places.
Naraynaswamy said that it was the same animal which had killed three persons during last one month. "We had observed its behavioural pattern during the combing operations, the animal never ventured beyond 500 metres to more than a km deep into the jungles from the boundary nor would it come out more than 100 metres from the demarcation line," he added.
"Hence, we suspected that it might have been ejected out of its territory by a dominant male in a territorial fight or it was an aged tiger unable to hunt and was confining itself to the forest boundary line where stray animals were an easy pick. But unfortunately it also preyed on human beings. Then, we focused our operations along the periphery of the forests and the demarcation line," he added .
The theory that the tiger could be aged or injured was corroborated when it was tranquilised and the veterinarians confirmed that badly injured on front and back legs .The tiger was put in a cage and there were plans to shift it to the Mysore Zoo for the veterinarians to treat and study the animal.(UNI)