A mural depicting two tigers. Credit: nagarjun/Flickr, CC BY 2.0.
India’s first interstate tiger translocation experiment has failed, after tigress Sundari had to be returned from Odisha to Madhya Pradesh, her state of origin, on March 23.
Officials had brought Sundari from the Bandhavgarh Tiger Reserve in June 2018 and released her into Satkosia Tiger Reserve, in Odisha’s Angul district.
After her return, Sundari will be hosted at Gholera centre at the Kanha Tiger Reserve in Madhya Pradesh, and finally to Bandhavgarh Tiger Reserve forest.
Another tiger that had been moved out of Madhya Pradesh in June 2018, named Mahaveer, had been found dead in Satkosia reserve only five months later. A National Tiger Conservation Authority (NTCA) investigation found that Mahaveer had been killed by poachers.
Forest department officials had brought Sundari to Satkosia on June 28, 2018, from Bandhavgarh, and first housed her at a special enclosure. She was released into the wild on August 17 that year.
But in September, she was moved back into another enclosure after she killed two people, including a woman, in September.
Officials said at the time that Satkosia’s prey base was low, forcing Sundari into nearby human settlements in search of food, where a conflict led to the deaths.
Many people living in areas adjacent to the reserve resorted to violence following the incident; some agitators also set fire to forest department boats and an office.
But after officials expressed concerns about confining a wild cat in a pen for much longer, they decided to move her back to Madhya Pradesh.
In 2018, the Madhya Pradesh government had agreed to part with three pairs of tigers for the country’s first interstate tiger relocation project, in Satkosia. But the NTCA shelved the translocation programme in December 2019 and instead asked the Odisha government to return Sundari from Satkosia. Sundari is likely to have returned sooner if not for the COVID-19 pandemic.
Regional chief conservator of forests (Angul Circle), Pradeep Raj Karat, said they had been monitoring Sundari’s movement and found her to be in a normal psychological state and in good medical condition.
On March 23, a team of veterinary doctors and senior forest officials from Kanha National Park in Madhya Pradesh and forest officials from Odisha tranquilised Sundari. A group of veterinary doctors then examined Sundari before she was placed in a vehicle, Karat said.
In December 2020, Madhya Pradesh chief minister Shivraj Singh Chouhan also urged his Odisha counterpart Naveen Patnaik to ensure Sundari was well cared for.
According to the 2018 census, India’s tiger population had increased by 30% from 2011 to 2014 even though the number of tigers in Odisha had dropped from 32 to 28. There were still 28 tigers in Odisha in 2018.
Jayakrushna Panigrahi, secretary of the Odisha Environmental Society, ultimately said non-availability of sufficient prey had effectively ended the translocation programme.
Biswajit Mohanty, a former member of the National Wildlife Board, told Down To Earth that a lot of money had been wasted on the project and that the forest department should have consulted local people before moving Mahaveer and Sundari.
Ashis Senapathi is a freelancer and environmentalist. He has written for Times of India, Indian Express and Down to Earth, and has worked for the conservation of sea turtles in Odisha for over two decades.