Sariska awaits a tiger and a tigress, after losing all

Chandigarh, Apr 27 (UNI) After losing all ten tigers at the hands of poachers in less than three years, the Sariska national park in Alwar is awaiting a tiger and a tigress from the Ranthambore and the Kanha reserve forests.

The Rajasthan government has sent a proposal to the Union Ministry of Environment and Forests for a tiger couple about six months back, taking into account the decline in the incoming of tourists to Sariska since the last surviving tiger was poached there in 2004.

''We will have a male tiger from Ranthambore and a female from Kanha or vice versa so that the breeding again takes place in Sariska where unfortunately no tiger has been left now by the poachers,'' Rajasthan Principal Chief Conservator of Forests R P Kapoor told UNI.

He was here to attend the two-day National Seminar on 'Trees Outside Forests' which concluded yesterday.

At the same time, he said, the Sariska authorities have taken stringent steps to check poaching by sensitising and involving the local villagers within the reserve forest area.

With eleven small villages and hamlets in the core of Sariska, the involvement of the locals in the poaching operations was very much there, he said. ''They are lured by the rich well-organised gangs of poachers.'' He said six tigers were poached in 2002-03 and four in 2004 alone, while the CBI was presently investigating the entire case in which the bigwigs in poaching from Delhi and elsewhere were involved.

''Everybody knows the involvement of Delhi's Kingpin Sansar Chand in poaching,'' he pointed out. One Sansar Chand, wanted in at least 40 registered cases of poaching, had been sentenced to five-year imprisonment by a Rajasthan court 2004.

The Rajasthan government had permitted the CBI to probe the disappearance of tigers in Sariska in June 2005 on the request of the Union Ministry of Environment and Forests.

Some of the preventive measures to check poaching will be ensured, before a tiger couple arrives at Sariska, include fencing, increase in manpower including the rangers and forest guards and formation of vigilance units among the locals, he said.

The Rajasthan government has also sent a proposal in this regard to the Union Ministry of Environment and Forests which would involve an expenditure of about Rs four crore.

At one time, the Sariska tiger reserve had 24 tigers and 49 leopards in 1995, before losing all tigers by 2004.

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