A man-eating tiger in the Pilibhit district of Uttar Pradesh is disrupting the electioneering in the poll-bound state.
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The two-year-old female prowling in the Indo-Nepal Terai region since November has killed five people and also injured an old woman sleeping in the veranda so far.
After the villagers found the half-eaten body of 52-year-old Nanhe Lal in the wheat fields of Piparia Karam village on February 7, the feline has been declared a man-eater.
The residents of the area continue to feel unsafe as they have submitted their licensed firearms to the police ahead of the elections.
"It has become a harrowing ordeal for me to campaign in the area", Dr Shailendra Gangwar, BSP candidate from one of the assembly seats in Pilibhit told Mail Today.
"I am not able to hold any public meetings as everyone including me is scared that the tigress might pounce on us at any time. At public gatherings even if a dog barks, people run for cover," he added.
Farmers of the region are also feeling unsafe as they had to submit their weapons and explosives like firecrackers which are usually used to scare away wild animals. The man-eater is said to have travelled about 15 kilometres after it took down the first victim in Mallpur village.
According to Mail Today, the Joint field force of Pilibhit Tiger Reserve (PTR) and the social forestry department had succeeded in besieging the killer tigress in a sugarcane field in Chandupur village. Senior forest officials are monitoring the situation.
Contradicting the count of 40-45 tigers in the region by the divisional forest, the villagers claim that as the cubs of the tigers have grown, the total tally could be around 60-65.
Since the incident, the UP government has deployed its entire forest and wildlife machinery to nab the big cat. Three veterinarians from the Lucknow zoo have also been involved in the effort to catch the tigress. Four elephants from the Dudhwa Tiger Reserve in Lakhimpur-Kheri district have also been brought over for the search operation.
"Through an analysis of her pug marks and nature of kills we realised that she, most likely, has a mouth injury due to which she is not hunting other wild animals or even the cattle around," said Umendra Sharma principal chief conservator of forests (wildlife).
"She lies around the wheat fields in the afternoon and drags out sleeping people from their homes and verandahs at night time. Sleeping people are the easiest kill for a tiger on the prowl. Plus, she ate only the soft parts and not the bones", he added.
The man-eater will be send to the Lucknow zoo if caught alive. But there is also a legal provision to shoot the cat, if the circumstances demand it.
