A farmer was killed in a tiger attack in the Moliyur range of Bandipur Tiger Reserve on Monday.
The victim, who was in his mid-30s, was identified as Balaji Naik of Kaadabeguru in Saragur taluk. Parts of his lower limbs were found to be eaten by the tiger and the distraught family members and local villagers were at the sight grieving over the incident.
Senior officials, including BTR director Ramesh Kumar, reached the spot on receiving information and were confronted by angry villagers.
Bandipur, which is spread over 912 sq km, harbours 150 tigers — the second highest in the country after Jim Corbet National Park in Uttarakhand as per the latest report by the National Tiger Conservation Authority (NTCA) released in July this year.
The number of tigers utilising the Bandipur forests has been pegged at 191; but within a radius of 1 km of the forest boundary abutting Bandipur are 136 villages with thousands of people whose economic sustenance is by way of rearing domestic livestock and farming. This has escalated human-animal conflict and claims many lives every year.
It was only last week that a few Forest Department staff were roughed up by in another range – Hediyala – by local villagers when a shepherd was injured in a tiger attack following which combing operations were launched in the Nanjangud taluk of Mysuru district. Officials have laid camera traps and deployed camp elephants for combing the area.
