Poachers kill rhino in Assam, chop off its horn

Guwahati: In what has alerted the wildlife authorities in Assam, poachers on Friday killed yet another one-horn rhino in Orang National Park in Sonitpur district and chopped off its horn.

Informing that carcass of the rhino, with its horn removed, was recovered near the Pisalmukh forest camp on Friday morning, wildlife authorities of the park said that forest guards had heard bullet shots in the night but could not reach the place where incident took place.

Pointing out that poachers have started targeting rhinos in Orang National Park, wildlife authorities said that in view of strict vigilance in Kaziranga National Park, poachers might have shifted their focus to other wildlife sanctuaries.

Referring the instance of a fatal road accident on Tuesday, which unearthed a case of poaching of one-horned rhino in Assam’s Kamrup district, wildlife authorities said that they are yet to recover the carcass of the rhino, whose horn was recovered from a vehicle that collided head-on with a bus near Baihata Chariali. “While three persons travelling in the vehicle died, another was struggling for his life at a hospital in Guwahati,” police said, adding that they have registered a case and trying to ascertain the place where rhino was killed. Police said that the location of the road accident has raised suspicion of poachers having procuring the horn from Sonitpur district, police said.

“We have recovered a rhino horn, which has blood stains, butt of a country-made gun and some white powder-like substance from their possession. When we reached the accident spot, two of them had already died. We took the other two travellers of the vehicle to a hospital immediately. While one of them succumbed in the hospital, the second injured is struggling for life,” police said.

Assam forest minister Pramila Rani Brahma, however, said that she has asked the forest officials in Kaziranga National Park, Orang National Park and the Pabitora Wildlife sanctuaries to carry out search operations in the protected areas to find out if there was any poaching.