IWN Daily Digest — Thursday, 16 April 2026
On the Ground at Bandhavgarh
The National Tiger Conservation Authority (NTCA) held a review meeting on tiger mortality cases in Madhya Pradesh at Bandhavgarh Tiger Reserve this week — taking the unusual step of convening on-site rather than in Delhi or Bhopal. The meeting was attended by the Chief Wildlife Warden of Madhya Pradesh (CWLW MP), the Additional Principal Chief Conservator of Forests Wildlife (APCCF WL MP), the DIG NTCA, and field officials from the reserve. According to a post on NTCA’s official X account, the DIG NTCA emphasised strict compliance with standard operating procedures (SOPs) on tiger mortality, and highlighted the importance of timely reporting and investigation.
The meeting lands at a moment of sustained pressure on the reserve and on the state. India recorded 166 tiger deaths in 2025 — a rise of 40 from 126 in 2024, and the highest annual toll in over a decade, according to official NTCA data. Madhya Pradesh led all states with 55 deaths, nearly a third of the national total. Bandhavgarh has been the most scrutinised reserve within the state: in the two and a half months between November 2025 and February 2026 alone, eight tigers died there — four from natural causes inside the reserve, and four from electrocution in surrounding general forest area.
A Reserve Under Pressure
The Madhya Pradesh High Court has been tracking the situation closely. In February 2026, it directed Bandhavgarh’s Field Director to submit a detailed status report on unnatural deaths and prosecutions — after a PIL filed by wildlife activist Ajay Dubey alleged that officials were routinely classifying suspicious deaths as territorial fights. The field director’s report, submitted on 26 February, acknowledged the four electrocution deaths outside reserve boundaries and cited letters sent to the electricity department requesting reinforced power lines in sensitive zones. Critics found the response inadequate.
Compounding the problem: against a sanctioned strength of 165 forest guards, 66 posts remain vacant at Bandhavgarh. Budget allocations for ground-level operations have been trimmed. And for over a year before NTCA’s intervention, the reserve had no full-time Field Director — a gap the NTCA had flagged and ordered to be filled.
What the Meeting Signals
An on-site NTCA review at a tiger reserve under active High Court scrutiny is not routine. It signals that Delhi has accepted the gravity of the situation at Bandhavgarh and is no longer content to receive reports from a distance. Whether that translates into the staff appointments, budget restoration, and anti-poaching enforcement that the reserve actually needs is the question that conservationists — and the Madhya Pradesh High Court — will be watching closely in the weeks ahead.
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