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Wednesday, January 5, 2011

Agitation against tiger project turns ugly in Satara

Published: Wednesday, Jan 5, 2011, 11:32 IST
By DNA Correspondent | Place: Satara (Maharashtra) | Agency: DNA


The protest march by villagers against the Sahyadri Tiger Project took an ugly turn on Monday evening when angry villagers pelted stones on the forest department (wildlife) office in Patan in Satara district.

The villagers were agitating against the Sahyadri Tiger Project, which was initiated last year by combining the Koyna Wildlife Sanctuary and Chandoli National Park.

The rally, led by Zilla Parishad (ZP) member, Rajabhau Shelar; Patan Panchayat Samiti’s former president, Satyajeetsinh Patankar; ZP’s former deputy president, Vikrambaba Patankar; and Panchayat Samiti president, Pooja Kadam; started from Koynanagar bus stand.

However, when the villagers reached the forest office, they suddenly started pelting stones at the forest office and broke the doors and windows. They also raised slogans like ‘Save man, not tiger’.

Opposing the project, spread over four districts of Satara, Ratnagiri, Kolhapur and Sangli, they submitted a memorandum to tehsildar, Pralhad Hiramani.

There are 90 villages in the buffer zone of the project and 83 villages in the core zone. Though the villagers will not be relocated, the project shall restrict development activities in the hamlets.

Tiger mauls teen

OUR CORRESPONDENT
Guwahati, Jan. 4: A 16-year-old boy was mauled by a tiger at Kaziranga National Park this morning when he was tending to his cattle.

A senior park official said Saibur Rahman, a resident of Bhujmari village, was attacked around 10.30am.

“The high density of tigers… is leading to increased tiger-human conflict incidents,” a forest official said.

Experts said given the high density of tigers in the national park, incidents like this will happen.

A camera-trapping study of tigers carried out has reported that there are 32 tigers per 100sqkm of the national park, the highest in the world.

The usual density of tigers varies from 3-12 per 100sqkm in different reserves throughout the country.

The study had said one of the key reasons for the high tiger density in Kaziranga is an abundance of prey, including hog deer, sambar, swamp deer and wild buffalo.

Villagers found Saibur’s body today and cremated him.

The forest official said park employees have been deployed in the area where the tiger has attacked Saibur to monitor the animals.