The Kill

The weather had been extremely pleasant the whole day. The guests had all checked out in the afternoon and there were no new guests checking in till Tuesday. As usual four of the staff at Wildcat Resort Tadoba prepared to go home at 5.45 pm. They stayed in the nearby village “Shivni” It was a daily walk of 3 Kms for them. Whenever there were guests they would stay overnight, else they would return home and return next morning. The road to Shivni was scenic and beautiful on both the sides. Between the village and the resort there was a small water body surrounded by the dense Jungle. It was a visual treat for the eyes. One would love to walk on this road. But then this beauty had a “Beast” roaming around! The striped beast had been spotted at regular intervals at the water body by many people. Everyone was aware of his presence, but the villagers have been accustomed to his presence you can say.

It was this fateful day of 29th January, 06:21 in the evening. Rajani, Leena, Nanaji and Jagdish who worked at the Wildcat Resort had walked only a 100 feet that they saw a herd of buffaloes rushing frantically towards them. Suddenly Jagdish had a intuition. He was the son of the Jungle who knew the pulse of nature. He waved his hand signaling all to stop and said” Wait! There’s a Tiger…..Everyone froze.

In the next second a huge tiger jumped from the bushes and held a calf by the throat. Everyone was dazed by the sudden attack. Blood oozed out rapidly and there was only a slight struggle and the calf succumbed. The tiger sensed there was lot of people around and swiftly leapt to the other side of the road and disappeared. The calf lay still on the road side. The other cattle had fled and the people had stopped in their cars expecting the tiger to come back. The tiger always come back for its “Kill” But it was obvious he would be back only after dark. I had rushed with Punam, Nilesh and my Husband to the spot in our car as soon as our staff called me and told this. My heart was thumping loud and there was a sudden fear of the tiger lurking around. Like others we also waited at a distance for quite some time at the spot. After half an hour we returned back deciding to come back after dark.

We returned to the same spot after dinner, but the Tiger has already dragged its Kill as soon as it was dark and lonely.

All the four who had seen this incident were shocked and the whole village was abuzz with the story the whole night. Everyone had grew alert and kept watching for Tiger movement.

The next day the forest department conducted a panchnama of the incident. They put a sticker on the tree opposite to our Resort “Beware of Tiger” roaming around. All the locals were almost used to these happenings but for me, it was a new thing. I was shaken up. I kept on thinking about the pain the small calf must have felt when the sharp teeth cut across his tender throat. But that’s the law of nature and we humans can do nothing about it. Still I could not take it off my mind until I had poured it on paper. And so I did.

Now I have started telling my tourist guests that you don’t need a safari, Tadoba Tiger sightings are happening right at our Wildcat Resort Gate!!