NTCA admits to poaching behind recent tiger deaths across country

Bhopal/Jabalpur: The National Tiger Conservation Authority (NTCA) presented an affidavit before a division bench of Madhya Pradesh High Court, admitting to poaching as one of the major reasons for the recent sharp spike in incidents of unnatural tiger deaths in and around protected big cat reserves across the country.The affidavit followed the court’s direction of a response to a PIL by the NTCA over frequent incidents of unnatural tiger deaths in and around tiger reserves, many of which, it admitted, were due to poaching.“(The) illegal demand for body parts and derivatives of tigers outside the country continues to be a serious threat to wild tigers. Therefore, protection is accorded topmost priority by the NTCA,” the authority stated in its affidavit in response to the plea filed by wildlife activist Ajay Dubey.The NTCA stated further that it constantly engages with states, issues them alerts, besides closely working with the CBI, Wildlife Crime Control Bureau and the police departments of all states that are home to home to tiger reserves.The affidavit, submitted before the Jabalpur bench by assistant inspector general of forest (AIGF) at NTCA, Nandkishore Vyanktesh Kale, said evidence indicates the involvement of interstate and transnational criminal syndicates in trafficking tiger body parts, adding that financial transactions related to these crimes were under investigation.

Referring to measures suggested by the NTCA to prevent poaching of wild animals, including tigers, in and around the reserves, Kale said guidelines have been issued to the tiger range states, including a security plan for tiger reserves recommending intelligence gathering, deployment of strike teams, communication network, and use of firearms for prevention and detection of crimes.The NTCA guidelines also suggest periodic special drives for anti-poaching activities, asking states to gear up protection measures in and around tiger reserves and corridors based on “recent seizures of body parts/products”, the affidavit stated.The NTCA has also advised states to explore the application of artificial intelligence (AI) in the management of tiger reserves and mitigation of human-wildlife conflicts, adding that they should also replicate the model of State Tiger Strike Force (Madhya Pradesh) or similar models operational in other states such as Tamil Nadu.The affidavit stated further that from 2015 to 2025, the average tiger deaths per year in the country hovered around 122, adding that the NTCA has taken several steps under the ongoing centrally-sponsored Project Tiger initiative to address poaching, which too, is significantly controlled as seen in the confirmed poaching and seizure cases.The officer further submitted that due to concerted efforts under Project Tiger, India, at present, has the distinction of having the maximum number of tigers in the world at 3,682 as per a 2022 assessment, when compared to other tiger range countries.“Tigers were observed to be increasing at a rate of 6% per annum in India when consistently sampled areas were compared from 2006 to 2022,” the affidavit outlined.He, however, acknowledged the seriousness of unnatural tiger deaths and illegal wildlife trade, adding that the NTCA, through a dedicated standard operating procedure (SOP) , has a stringent protocol to ascribe cause to a tiger death, which is treated as unnatural, unless otherwise proved by the state concerned through submission of necropsy reports, histopathological and forensic assessments besides photographs and circumstantial evidences.Activist Dubey, in his PIL, said there were 54 tiger deaths in MP in 2025, the highest since the beginning of Project Tiger in 1973, adding that there have been 10 more big cat deaths in the state in the beginning of this year itself.According to official data of MP’s Bandhavgarh reserve, 57 percent of the tiger deaths were unnatural, the reason being poaching, electrocution or other factors, Dubey cited in his PIL, adding that the presence of poachers inside tiger reserves was a matter of grave concern.