Madhya Pradesh: Elusive tiger stays put in Mhow, kills another cow

Mhow (Madhya Pradesh): The elusive tiger has been on the prowl in Mhow range for the last 16 days. Feline’s rendezvous with Mhow started with a week-long sighting in Army War College. Later, it killed a cow in Malendi village in the night of May 15.

Since, then it has been moving in the forest within a radius of two to three kilometres of Malendi. Forest officials felt that the tiger might have moved towards dense forest. However, on Monday night, the tiger made its second kill-- a farmer’s cow—within 700 metres of the first kill. These two incidents have led to panic in Malendi and nearby villages. Malendi village turns desolate in evening hours as villagers prefer to stay indoors out of fear.

According to reports, two cows were tied in tapir near Girdhari Lal’s hut adjacent to forest drain. When the tiger arrived, one of the cows panicked and tried to escape after breaking the rope. However, tiger preyed on it and carried its carcass 150 metres away on the other side of the drain. Woman of the house Dularibai woke up after hearing dogs bark. She went outside and found a cow tied and another missing.

Girdhari realised that one of his cows had been killed by tiger after he woke up in the morning. Forest department’s divisional officer Kailash Joshi said that wounds on the tiger were not very big and seemed to have been received while trying to kill the cow. He said that the tiger was wounded as the cow could have put up a resistance. Specialist doctor Atul Gupta said that such wounds were normal and not very serious.