Th Supreme Court has jailed a Ranthambore Tiger named ‘Ustad’ or T-24 for killing four humans in five years. The verdict of life sentence came as a surprise to many as they believe that extending such hard punishments to the animal world is unfair and against the India’s ‘Save Tiger’ campaign.
The verdict was given by a bench of three justice including Chief Justice TS Thakur and Justices R Banumathi and UU Lalit. Challenging the decision, Tiger conservationist Ajay Dubey, through senior advocate Indira Jaising said that claiming Ustad to be a maneater is extremely hard decision as no proofs are present to prove it.
There have been four human killings associated with the Ustad in past five years, but no one has ever seen T-24 killing a human. Everytime, Ustad was found roaming around the body when officials figured out the dead body.
In addition, Jaising opposed the court’s decision to shift the T-24 from Ranthambore to hundreds of kilometers away in Sajjangarh Zoological Park in Udaipur, Rajasthan.
While appealing she explained the judges that there is a huge difference between a maneater where a tiger hunts human habitually and tigers who are forced to kill humans due to an encounter by chance. In all the four occasions, Ustad killed humans by chance.
“There is a difference between a man-eater tiger which habitually hunts humans, and tigers who may have had a chance encounter with humans primarily due to provocation by humans. Tigers involved in chance encounters are not to be removed from their natural habitat and evidence against T-24 can be at best attribute his involvement in chance encounters,” she said.
On the lack of evidence remark made by Jaising, the bench of court said that we don’t need evidence whether the tiger killed humans or not as it will not roam around to body to guard, killing humans is his natural instinct. Judges further added that Ustad will keep on killing humans if not barred. Thus, T-24 will keep on entertaining the crowd in Sajjangarh Zoological Park.
Discussion6 Comments
This is appalling. Humans encroach more and more into wild land and it’s somehow the tiger’s fault when people die? Tigers are apex predators. Humans are, by comparison, weak and flimsy prey items. If humans wander onto a tiger’s path, that’s their own fault.
That zoo better treat Ustad well. It’s gonna be a serious $hitstorm if we find out later that his habitat is filthy or his physical and/or psychological condition gets bad. The second he starts frantically pacing, he should be let free.
First, T24 didn’t kill 4, he was suspected of killing. The last kill no human DNA was found so he was cleared by NTCA. NTCA has told the Forest Department that he is to be released so instead the FD and Zoo made him sick so that he started eating dirt and had to have surgery. This is corruption, money, and lies and I never thought in my life time I would see anything so EVIL.
This is so wrong…..a zoo is a death sentence for him!!!! God help the wildlife in this corrupt world!!!
I wonder who designates him as a man eater because as per NTCA, WII and IVRI he is not a man eater and a normal tiger. He is not proven guilty of 4 deaths but still if we consider him responsible for them they all happen in core tiger territory, what you expect from the tiger? Let them live free in their homes or shut down the whole Project Tiger.
The hoteliers responsible for framing him are still making money on tiger blood, and I curse them for doing this.
T24 has not committed the crimes he has been accused from and sentenced to the #ZooPrison. He did not escape from his home and so has never been of any danger to any human beings in humans territory. If people are entering to tiger habitat they do that on their own responsibility and risk. The hotellier who is responsible for framing him for these deaths should be closed down they have no right to be there in the first place. It is incredible to see the amount of corruption going on around in this case. It is a high time that India would show to the outside world that there still exists justice and transparency and that the justice can happen in the form of pardoning this innocent Tiger, effective immediately.
The place he is now kept is not suitable to keep any animals, it is filthy the food provided is not suitable for Tigers or any other species and as a direct result of the bad care he got sick and need it to have a surgery.
He is not a man eater but the people who have imprisoned him are the monsters. how is it that people can harass scare and treat other creatures with disrespect, and kill and harm? yet if that creature so much as spits is called an evil killer. Humans are the killers leave him be in his home land and stop harassing them. you are quick to kill if they walk into your home, even though you have built on that creatures territory yet you can’t leave them alone in the small area that they can still call home. shame on the humans once again. disgraceful