More than 100 blew conch shells before the attack

The encounter with the locals of a remote

Sunderbans

village on Saturday night was a horrible experience of my life.


As we were joining the dots in the recent case of the unnatural death of a tiger in the forests of Ajmalmari I — located in the buffer zone of the mangroves — we came to know about some names. Accordingly, we decided to raid a few houses in Bhasha Gurguria village. Early on Saturday morning, we even picked up one of the accused, Ashok Mondal, who used to lay traps in the forest.

While questioning him, we got to know about the involvement of three more persons and decided to raid the village again within 24 hours. But what happened late at night on Saturday was beyond our imagination. As soon as we entered the village around 10.45pm, we could hear sound of

conch

shells coming from a distance. The sound became louder, as we moved forward and reached a narrow lane flanked by two ponds. Our forest guards were also carrying arms with them. But, before we could understand anything, more than 100 villagers, including over 70 women, attacked us with sickles, axes and iron rods.

The forest department team, comprising 30 men, was outnumbered by the villagers, who kept showering blows on us. It continued for about an hour before some of us managed to beat a hasty retreat. But, by then five of us were severely injured. I received seven stitches on my head.

But, we have inched closer to solving the case and by now, we can say that a poachers’ gang from Kultoli is active in the Sunderbans.

Its members, including Mondal, had even laid traps in the forests of Herobhanga on March 31, more than a week before the tiger carcass was found in Ajmalmari on April 8.

We were already on the lookout for Mondal and other gang members when we came across the tiger carcass. They mostly target

deer

, the main prey animal of the

big cat

in the Sunderbans.

So far, we have arrested three persons in the case, but six members of the gang, including two couples, are still at large.

(Santhosha, DFO of South 24 Parganas forest division, spoke to Krishnendu Mukherjee and Subhojyoti Kanjilal)