Five charged with tiger poaching in Goa

PANAJI - The Goa forest department has filed charges against five people for allegedly poaching a tiger in the Mhadei wildlife sanctuary, a top official said Saturday.

The department, which had also accused a well-known wildlife activist and whistle blower in the poaching case, Rajendra Kerkar, of abetment to poaching, has dropped the charges against him.

“The charge sheet was filed before a local court,” chief conservator of forests Shashi Kumar told reporters Saturday.

Sources said that in the charge sheet, five people — Gopal Majik, Ankush Majik, Nagesh Majik, Suryakant Majik and Pintu Gawas — have been accused of trapping a tiger in a wire snare and shooting it to death in February 2009. They then allegedly burnt the carcass to destroy evidence.

Top officials of the forest department, including the CCF, were accused of hushing up the tiger killing, after they refused to acknowledge the incident when Kerkar published a news report about it along with a photograph of the dead tiger in a national newspaper.

Forest department officials then named Kerkar as an abettor, claiming that the whistle-blower was not co-operating with the investigations.