How they killed the poster cubs of Panna

Exposed: Monitoring team did not let the Panna father meet his cubs for 4 months since birth

Open Magazine, 15 September, 2010

With cubs from the only litter born to reintroduced tigers missing for three weeks now, authorities seem to be at a loss to explain the setback to the government’s high-profile drive to repopulate Sariska and Panna. One of the three missing cubs has apparently been traced, but even the authorities have given up hope for the other two following reports of repeated fights between their parents.

While Dr Rajesh Gopal, head of National Tiger Conservation Authority, went on record saying that “such conflicts are common among tigers leading to the death of newborn cubs”, Panna Field director SR Murthy found it “intriguing” that the lone Panna male tiger that fathered the cub got aggressive with the mother and the babies.

Official reports, however, reveal that the deaths are neither intriguing nor common. The conflict was the result of an inexplicable intervention, in violation of the basics of cat biology, by a joint team of state forest department and Wildlife Institute of India that monitors the three reintroduced big cats in Panna.

In his note sent to HS Pabla, Principle Chief Conservator of Forests, Madhya Pradesh, on September 13, field director Murthy admitted that while the father (T3) tried to approach the mother (T1) and the cubs soon after they were born, the monitoring staff “did not allow such meetings”, essential for natural familiarisation.

According to this report, the litter of four cubs was born on April 15/16. Shockingly, it took the monitoring team four months to get “technical and scientific opinions from all quarters and the project team of WII” before allowing the father to meet the tigress and the cubs on August 19.

Murthy reported repeated fights between T1 and T3 once they were allowed to meet. In all likelihood, the tiger could not identify the cubs as his own and tried to kill them so that he could mate with the tigress again. Like any tigress, T1 resolutely defended her cubs, at the risk of injuries to herself, but apparently could not save all of them.

Male tigers are instinctively protective about their cubs and there are several recorded instances of them helping the tigress bring up the babies by sharing kills etc. It is only when a father is ousted by another male that infanticide takes place with the new male trying to kill his predecessor’s cubs – partly to establish his own bloodline and also to free the tigress that refuses to mate while bringing up cubs.

Since T3 is the only male tiger in Panna, it is inexplicable why the authorities denied him access to his cubs. “Normal course of familiarisation would never have allowed such aggressive behaviour. Someone needs to explain how such a decision to keep the father away was taken under the nose of top forest officials and in the presence of experts from WII,” said tiger expert Valmik Thapar, who recorded, as far back as in the 1980s, how male tigers took care of their cubs in Ranthambhore.