Mathura: A tiger outside Mathura attacked six people, causing panic. However, the attacking carnivore, as experts claim, is not a man-eater and hoping that live bait and tranquiliser guns do the trick.
A young male tiger has been on the run on the outskirts of the city of Mathura for three days now eluding forest officials and causing panic amongst people who live there.
Tension has been running high near the Mathura refinery in Uttar Pradesh as an unlikely inhabitant - a tiger has taken refuge here over the last three days and attacked at least six people causing panic among locals. An angry mob came out with sticks and batons agitating the big cat.
“It injured four people at once. Then at 7 O'clock, it injured a child. After that it injured the child's father or his relative,” said a panic-stricken local Chetan Singh.
And now experts are concerned that because of pressure from local people the animal has been labeled a man-eater, and will therefore be shot dead. But the question remains – whether the tiger is at all a man-eater?
“The tiger is not a man-eater. It hasn’t killed and consumed any human part. It attacked people only when they came close to him and disturbed him,” said Kartick Satyanarayan, Wildlife SOS.
Another question - where did the big cat come from?
“Looks like it has come from Ranthambore, which has nearly 40 tigers. So where will the excess tigers go? Either they will go to the Keladevi sanctuary or reach Mathura via Chambal,” said Joseph Vattakaven, tiger expert, WWF-India.
With live baits and tranquiliser guns at the spot, hopes are high that the stray tiger will be caught safely and returned to the wild.
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