the goan I network
PANAJI
Lost for reasons and excuses for the shocking killing of four big cats -- a tigress, a sub-adult male and two cubs -- at the Golavali village in the Mhadei Wildlife Sanctuary, Chief Minister Pramod Sawant now spoke of the government taking proactive steps to relocate people living in those areas to other places outside the sanctuary.
In a matter of three days since the first sub-adult (four-year-old) male tiger’s carcass was found on Sunday, forest department officials have recovered carcasses of a full grown tigress and two cubs. All four big cats died allegedly from poisoning and three members of the Dhangar community have been taken into custody as suspects allegedly responsible for poisoning the majestic striped cats.
The chief minister claimed to have directed the Forest department to survey Goa’s forested areas and identify villages where remote dwellings exist, particularly in the tiger territories and kick-start the procedures to relocate the people.
Sawant also said that there were only two families living in the vicinity of the area where the tiger carcasses were found in the Mhadei Wildlife Sanctuary and both will be shifted.
Meanwhile, samples of all the four tiger carcasses have been sent to the central forensic laboratory in Hyderabad for further analysis. Post mortem examinations conducted on the dead tigers could not pin-point the exact cause of the deaths, and if it did, officials have kept it under wraps owing to the sensitivity of the case.
The Chief Minister also said that the principal Chief Conservator of Forests has been directed to prepare the proposal to relocate the two Dhangar families from the Sanctuary. Other remote areas where people live are also to be enumerated and proposals prepared to relocate them too, Sawant added.
“We will relocate them and their cattle. If there are people living in remote areas, we should insist that they shift to habitated areas. I have
instructed PCCF... Their lives are in danger,” Sawant said, adding that the four tigers dying is national loss.
The State and the Central government will take steps quickly so that such tragedies do no recur.
Meanwhile, the Union Ministry of Environment, Forests and Climate Change has also appointed a separate two-member committee to probe the killing of the four tigers.
