About 3,000 tigers live in its 540 national parks and sanctuaries, including this one at a watering hole in Bandhavgarh tiger reserve. Some tour guides believe he is the grandson of Sita, the tiger made famous in National Geographic in 1997 and now dead - a poacher's victim. A wild tiger, observed in her natural environment from atop an elephant's back. Not 10 feet away. Our guide said it was one of Sita's famous daughters.
Tigers walk the richest parts of India.
The wealth of the nation and the fate of its most powerful symbol are in conflict. That's what Valmik Thapar, author of eight books on India's tigers and the executive director of the Ranthambhore Foundation, which works to conserve tiger habitat, said in an interview in his New Delhi study. Poaching or encroaching on their habitat kills a tiger a day, Thapar estimates. The political will to link the handful of tiger reserves around the country isn't strong, and more tigers and land will be lost. We lose something like 5,000 square kilometers of tiger habitat a year,'' said the passionate spokesman, tapped to bend President Clinton's ear when he visited the Ranthambhore National Park in March.