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The Spectre of poaching may return to haunt Ranthambhore after lab analyses of samples from 225 pieces of bones seized from poachers near Sheopur, Madhya Pradesh, earlier this month concluded that the seizure accounted for three tigers and one leopard.
The big cats, say sources in the MP forest department, were killed at different locations in the Chambal landscape — between Rajasthan’s Ranthambhore and MP’s Madhav tiger reserve.
Sheopur is 30 km from the southern boundary of Ranthambhore, and over 100 km from Madhav, a new reserve with a tiger population of five. Over 300 km to the east of Sheopur, Panna is the third nearest tiger reserve.
“We have seen occasional movement of tigers from Panna towards Chambal but the area where these poachers were operating is more than 250 km away. The migratory tigers they took out are almost certainly from Ranthambhore,” said a senior forest officer in Bhopal.
In a joint operation with the Rajasthan forest department and Sawai Madhopur NGO TigerWatch, the State Tiger Strike Force of Madhya Pradesh arrested Dauji Bheel and Sunita Dauji, residents of Dausa in Rajasthan, and Besta Bheel of Sheopur with big cat skulls and bones on June 5.
The seized bones were sent to a Jabalpur lab for DNA testing that concluded the killing of three tigers. The samples, it is learnt, are now with the National Centre for Biological Sciences, Bangalore. “The NCBS will match the DNAs and tell if the tigers came from Ranthambhore or Panna. This may take up to three weeks,” the forest officer said.
“A few bones have been identified as that of tiger. As a part of further investigation to find out the origin of these bones, the joint team of MP and Rajasthan forest departments are working in coordination,” Ranthambhore field director K R Anoop wrote in a report sent to Rajasthan’s Chief Wildlife Warden on June 24.
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Dauji Bheel is a Mogiya tribal who belongs to the family of traditional poachers, including Devi Singh who confessed to killing five tigers during 2002-04 in Ranthambore tiger reserve.
Dauji’s interrogation led to the arrest of another three members of this inster-state poaching syndicate. In Sheopur and Shivpuri, MP forest officials picked up Baniram Moghiya, Naresh (both from Shivpuri) and Rajaram Moghiya, resident of Tonk, Rajasthan.
In March, The Indian Express reported how investigators from five states and four Central agencies tracked an unusual coalition of groups from traditional poaching communities in central India, who used digital payments with “hawala funds” and separate supply lines to Nepal and Myanmar to kill over 100 tigers since 2022 from various parts of India.
Jay Mazoomdaar is an investigative reporter focused on offshore finance, equitable growth, natural resources management and biodiversity conservation. Over two decades, his work has been recognised by the International Press Institute, the Ramnath Goenka Foundation, the Commonwealth Press Union, the Prem Bhatia Memorial Trust, the Asian College of Journalism etc. Mazoomdaar’s major investigations include the extirpation of tigers in Sariska, global offshore probes such as Panama Papers, Robert Vadra’s land deals in Rajasthan, India’s dubious forest cover data, Vyapam deaths in Madhya Pradesh, mega projects flouting clearance conditions, Nitin Gadkari’s link to e-rickshaws, India shifting stand on ivory ban to fly in African cheetahs, the loss of indigenous cow breeds, the hydel rush in Arunachal Pradesh, land mafias inside Corbett, the JDY financial inclusion scheme, an iron ore heist in Odisha, highways expansion through the Kanha-Pench landscape etc. ... Read More
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