Adult male tiger set for reintroduction into wild

The transient adult tiger, native of Central India, is all set to get a new lease of life as the National Tiger Conservation Authority’s (NTCA) expert committee on Tuesday (February 10, 2026) decided to reintroduce it into the natural landscape.

Highly placed sources told The Hindu that the tiger conservationists of India have unanimously consented to send the big cat back to the forest, as it should no longer be confined to the Animal Rescue Centre (ARC). In the ARC, the tiger would have a threat of being exposed to ‘human imprint’ that might change its emotional response and behaviour. The forest in which it would be released, will be decided by the authorities concerned in a couple of days.

The experts, who decided the fate of the male tiger during the two-day brainstorming sessions, concluded that it is ‘innocent’ as it did not attack any human being during its 53-day sojourn in the four States—Maharashtra, Chhattisgarh, Telangana, and Andhra Pradesh—in which it walked for over 650-kilometre in search of ‘prey’.

On February 6, the Rajahmundry Wildlife Management personnel and Pune-based RESQ Trust experts tranquilised the tiger at Kurmapuram village in East Godavari district before moving it to the ARC in Visakhapatnam.

Operation STRIPES

The historic operation, in which the tiger was tranquilised in the human settlement without causing any harm to it, was named ‘Stripes’. The operation will continue till the tiger is reintroduced to the wild, sources of the State Forest Department told The Hindu. 

The operation is being seen as a new dawn in the history of tiger conservation in Andhra Pradesh as it ended without any harm to either the humans, frontline personnel, or the big cat. 

“The operation would not have succeeded without the support from the local communities,” claimed frontline staff who were involved in the operation. The tiger conservationists, wildlife experts of Andhra Pradesh, have welcomed the NTCA’s decision to reintroduce the tiger into the wild, asserting that the initiative would pave the way for the conservation of tigers in Andhra Pradesh.