BENGALURU: Mystery shrouds the death of a tiger aged about 7 years after its carcass was discovered under a bridge at Chikka Edagehalli village road in Gubbi taluk of Tumakuru district on Tuesday leading to suspicion that the big cat might have been poisoned to death.
However, forest officials are yet to ascertain its cause of death and an autopsy has been conducted by veterinarians from Bhadra Tiger Reserve. The carcass was found close to Ankanahalli State Forest in Gubbi taluk where there are no tigers.
On Tuesday morning, sources said a villager noticed a tiger under the bridge and initially thought that the tiger might have been in deep sleep. Even after a while, there were no movements of the tiger and the villager dared to get close to the tiger to examine the animal. He found the tiger dead and informed the forest officials.
Deputy Conservator of Forests, Tumakuru Anupama told Deccan Chronicle that a radius of 500-mts was examined to gather clues of any foul play but there were no signs any vehicles movements to establish the carcass might have been dumped at the place ferried from another place.
Though, sources said villagers sighted tiger movements in the vicinity but the DCF ruled out tiger sightings in the region. Adding the DCF said, patterns of the dead tiger have been sent to Tiger Cell at Aranya Bhavani in Bengaluru to verify images from the database to establish from where did the tiger come to Gubbi.
However, Anupama suspected that the tiger might have strayed into Gubbi from Bhadra Tiger Reserve in Chikkamagaluru district since there is a continuous stretch of forest connecting to Bhadra from Tumakuru via Kadur taluk.
