alThough the Maharashtra Forest Department is geared up to bust the North India based gangs of organised tiger poachers, who are presently active in Central India, there is no let-up in killing of tigers either by poachers for body parts, or by farmers to protect their cattle. As per the Forest Department, 115 tigers have been killed between 2018 and 2022, in which 24 deaths took place due to poaching. All these tiger deaths, including those poached, have been in the Vidarbha region. Abhay Kolarkar, an RTI activist who sought details of tiger deaths from the Maharashtra Wildlife Wing, said, “Nagpur takes pride in being called the Tiger Capital of India, but the big cats do not seem to be safe in the five tiger projects of Vidarbha, and this data is authenticating it.” Five out of the state’s six tiger projects in Maharashtra are in Vidarbha region. They are Melghat Tiger Reserve (Amravati), Tadoba-Andhari Tiger Reserve (Chandrapur), Pench Tiger Reserve (Nagpur), Bor Tiger Reserve (Wardha) and Navegaon-Nagzira Tiger Reserve (Bhandara). Sahyadri is Maharashtra’s only tiger project that is outside Vidarbha and is spread over Satara, Sangli, Kolhapur, and Ratnagiri districts. Out of 115 tiger deaths, 67 have been attributed to natural causes, 24 to poaching, 12 to road accidents and 10 to electrocution.

 

In 2021-22, the highest number of tigers - 32 - were killed in Maharashtra, including 7 due to poaching, which is the highest in the past five years. In 2022-23, there were 29 tiger deaths, of which 3 happened due to poaching; 4 deaths each happened due to road accident and electrocution. Sources in the Forest Department said that as per the 2018 tiger census data, there were 312 tigers in Maharashtra , all of which were in Vidarbha. Tadoba Andhari Tiger Reserve (TATR), with 85 tigers, was the highest. Pench had 39 tigers, Melghat had 25, Navegaon-Nagzira had 8 tigers, and Bor had 5 tigers. There was no tiger in the Sahyadri Tiger Reserve then. The tiger population has increased in Maharashtra as per the latest tiger census 2023 which also attract the attention of poachers to commit crime in Maharashtra.