Pushed to corner, people may use guns to shoot tigers, warns MLC Veena Achaiah 

Ponnampet: The frequent appearance of tigers and killing of cattle heads in parts of South Kodagu has revived fears among locals who are pressurising the Forest Department to capture or shoot the big cats on the prowl. 

Pressure is mounting on the Department to act ever since a teenage boy and a 60-year-old woman were killed within hours of each other on Saturday evening and Sunday morning. The forest team later captured a cat in Manchalli, 3 kms from the spot where it had attacked the woman, and it has since been moved to Mysuru (see pic.) 

But attacks have continued and from Sunday last, three cows and one calf have been killed near Srimangala, Thavalageri village, just a kilometre from T Shettigeri. WhatsApp groups of Kodava community are flooded with reports of tiger sightings from villagers, warning fellow community members to be careful about the prowling big cats in many villages. 

Today morning for example, there were messages on social media from Badagarakeri near Birunani where some locals said they saw the tiger entering an estate. Yesterday there were messages on the cat being spotted near Besagoor village.

Villagers have claimed that there are at least four to five tigers within the radius of 15 to 20 kms starting from Ponnampet till the border of Kerala. While the Forest Department officials say that loss of territory has forced certain big cats to migrate from the Nagarahole Tiger Reserve and to adopt thick coffee plantations as their territories. Nagarahole has 125 tigers and the density was 11.82 tigers per 100 square kilometres.

Political slugfest

Increasing tiger attacks in South Kodagu has also resulted in political slugfest. While MLAs from the ruling BJP are observing a stoic silence on the attacks and loss of lives — both human beings and cattle heads — the Opposition Congress and the JD(S) has upped the ante in criticising the Government.  

MLC Veena Achaiah has urged the State Government to give permission to the people to shoot down man-eating tigers. “If the Government does not control the situation, the people may take to the guns, left without a choice,” she said.

Addressing reporters in Madikeri yesterday, she said, “There is a situation of panic in South Kodagu and people are losing their patience. Many farmers have lost their livestock to tigers. The Government should wake up before the people take the law into their hands,” she said.

“It is agreed that preservation of wild animals is our duty. But when it comes to the danger posed to the lives of people by tigers, we cannot keep quiet. If the Government cannot stop the attacks by wild animals, give a free hand to the villagers,” she said and added that Forest Department officials in Bengaluru must come out of the air-conditioned rooms to know the ground realities of people. 

District Congress leader Dharmaja Uthappa has said that tigers caught in forest fringes of other States and regions are being brought to Kodagu and are left inside the coffee plantations. “Of late huge lorries are moving in Srimangala, Kutta and Ponnampet regions near Nagarahole during midnight. The man-eater tigers captured in other districts and States are being released in South Kodagu. Earlier, the cases of tiger attacks were very less and now they have seen an exponential increase,” he claimed. 

“As the Nagarahole, Brahmagiri and Pushpagiri Wildlife Divisions are declared as preserved forests, the Forest Department is looking to increase forest cover by adding more and more green area as buffer zones. They are converting the district into a tiger reserve,” he alleged.