In a tragic turn of events, the Tadoba-Andhari Tiger Reserve (TATR) in Maharashtra's Chandrapur district has been forced to suspend all bamboo extraction activities within its buffer zone. This drastic decision comes in the wake of three separate fatal tiger attacks on migrant labourers engaged in bamboo cutting, all occurring within a span of just ten days.
Safety Review After Fatal Attacks
The suspension order was confirmed by TATR field director Dr. Prabhu Nath Shukla. He stated that the reserve management is currently reassessing the risks of human-wildlife conflict before making any decision on resuming the work. "We are reviewing the situation in light of the recent casualties and will consult with all stakeholders before arriving at a final decision," Dr. Shukla explained. The latest incidents saw two labourers killed in separate attacks on Saturday, December 28, within the TATR buffer. This followed another fatal attack on December 18 in the Moharli buffer range. Shockingly, all three victims were migrant workers from Madhya Pradesh, working without any formal safety cover.
A Patchwork of Policies Endangers Workers
While TATR has taken a precautionary stand, the situation presents a stark and dangerous contrast in neighbouring forest areas. Officials from the Chandrapur territorial forest circle and the Forest Development Corporation of Maharashtra (FDCM) confirmed that no directive to halt operations has been issued for their jurisdictions. Bamboo extraction is continuing as scheduled in these forests, which are also part of the same high-risk landscape home to over 250 tigers.
This discrepancy has ignited serious concerns over the absence of uniform safety protocols for hundreds of labourers working deep inside tiger habitats. The workers are mobilised separately by TATR, the territorial circle, and the FDCM—either directly or through contractors. Although they are housed near human settlements, their daily assignments take them into the forest interiors, many of which are established tiger territories.
Growing Demands for Urgent Safeguards
The recent deaths have prompted strong demands from conservationists and former officials for immediate protective measures. Former honorary wildlife warden Bandu Dhotre has called for urgent safeguards, including:
- Deployment of trained volunteers to track tiger movement.
- Making it mandatory for labourers to work only in large, supervised groups.
- Establishing daily coordination between contractors and forest officials before sending workers into vulnerable patches.
The context for this large-scale extraction drive is the mass flowering of bamboo across Chandrapur last year. This natural phenomenon led to a widespread die-off of the bamboo, prompting forest authorities to undertake clearance operations to aid regeneration. The human cost, however, is becoming alarmingly high. Chandrapur remains one of Maharashtra's worst-affected districts for human-wildlife conflict, with 47 deaths in predator attacks recorded this year alone. Of these, a staggering 42 were caused by tigers.
Although no bamboo cutter fatalities have been reported so far in the territorial or FDCM-managed forests, the risk is ever-present. A recent close call in the FDCM's Chichpalli range led to the relocation of labourers after a tiger strayed dangerously close to their forest camp. The current scenario, where work is halted in one reserve but continues unabated in adjacent forests with the same risks, glaringly exposes the critical need for a standardised, district-wide safety framework to protect those working on the front lines of human-tiger interaction.
