According to a senior Forest official, the tiger had puncture wounds on its chest and a lot of pus in its upper respiratory tract.
Tiger captured in Kannur. (Representational/ iStock)
An elusive tiger, roaming around in a human settlement in Kannur for more than two weeks, that was successfully tranquilised and captured by Forest officials a day ago, died hours later, the Forest department said on Friday, 22 March.
According to a senior Forest official of the district, the tiger had puncture wounds on its chest and a lot of pus in its upper respiratory tract.
The post-mortem of the wild animal would be conducted on Friday, at Pookode Veterinary College under the supervision of a specially constituted committee and as part of the process toxicology and histopathology samples would be taken and sent for testing, the official said.
“Only after we get all those reports would we be able to conclude what the exact cause of death was,” he said.
On Thursday, 21 March, a team of forest officials managed to corner the tiger within a rubber plantation in Karyamkapp near Ulikkal in Kannur, administering tranquillizers before safely confining it in a cage.
Later, it was shifted to the Kannavam Forest Office premises where it died.
Two weeks ago, local residents informed the forest department about the tiger’s presence in the area. But it was not confirmed during their search.
However, five days ago, while returning from work in the afternoon, a rubber-tapping worker saw a tiger in the plantation near his house and recorded footage of it on his mobile phone.
Later, locals and Forest officials spotted the tiger several times and set up three cages, but they were unable to capture it.
This prompted the local residents to protest against the Forest officials.
Finally, on Thursday afternoon, the tiger was spotted in the rubber plantation, and the forest guards surrounded it and tranquillized it by 3 pm.
The tiger, after being tranquillized, ran a short distance, but within half an hour, the Forest guards caught it and locked it in a cage.
In February 2024, a rogue tusker Thanner Komban who was captured in Kerala, and then transferred to Karnatakata, died hours after being captured.
The tusker was darted with tranquiliser shots twice before being loaded onto a truck with the help of kumki elephants for being transported to Bandipur in Karnataka.
“After reaching Bandipur in the night, it was decided to conduct an examination before releasing the jumbo back into the forests,” Kerala Minister AK Saseendran had told reporters then in Kozhikode.
However, it is understood that the elephant was dead before the examination, the Minister said.
The Kerala government had then appointed a high-level committee headed by a chief conservator of forests (CCF) to probe whether there were any lapses in the capturing of Thaneer Komban.
The doctors who were part of the necropsy of the elephant told that as per preliminary reports, the cause of death was “pulmonary arrest”.
“There was a 40-cm-wide wound on the elephant’s thigh, which was filled with pus. There are chances of infection. We have collected the samples which will be sent to the laboratory for further examination,” Wayand Forest Veterinary Officer Dr Ajesh Mohandas, who was present during the autopsy of the elephant, told reporters.
He further said that the injury in the thigh was over a month old and the pulmonary arrest was due to that infection.
Mohandas said the animal had undergone heavy stress and trauma twice in the last month.
(With PTI inputs)
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