Sundari is missing

Death is the word doing the rounds in Ranthambore as far as tigress T-17’s mysterious disappearance is concerned. It is nearly a month since the tigress, also called Sundari, went missing from the reserve leaving its three one-year-old cubs literally in the lurch.
However, it is yet to be conclusively proved whether she had died as her body could not be traced even by the 110 strong force of foresters deployed to trace her. The fact that numerous camera traps in the reserve have not been able to locate her also makes chances of her being alive slim.
Wild life experts say that it is often difficult to trace the body of a big cat killed in the wild for they either get gobbled by Blue Bottle flies that thrive on the carcasses or that the territory of a tiger is simply too big to be able to scanned properly. However, officials are ‘pessimistically hopeful.’
Only two days back the top officials of the reserve were removed as part of a major shake-up of forest officials in the state.
“Sundari was a very safe tigress. She used to share her territory with three different males including T-12 (later shifted to Sariska), T-25, T-28 and so it is unlikely that she would have died in a territorial fight. In fact no one knows who is the father of her cubs T-25 or T-28. It was perhaps because she was edged out towards the Badlav-Uliyana area that she died,” said an official.
The Badlav-Uliyana area is notorious and known for illegal mining. It has recorded the revenge killing of two tigers by farmers. “She was first thrown out of T-28's area and later she along with her cubs had to give way to T-25. It was at this moment that the park authorities should have exercised caution. She may have been killed and buried somewhere or even poached away. It is the management of the park that fell through causing her likely death,” he added.
That should perhaps explain the death of a tiger in the Khandar area in December last year which has not yet been identified, followed by the death of T-37 on March and now finally ‘Sundari’.