“Even the field had never sighted one,” he said. CCF Virendra Tiwari, who was field director (2012-2014), too said he never heard about it. “Around that time camera trapping was launched extensively but the animal was never captured,” he said. PCCF (production & management) SH Patil, who wrote the plan and was Tadoba field director from 2004-09, said, “I didn’t sight it nor I was told about it.” Ex-PCCF VK Sinha worked in TATR from 2010-12 said though he had heard about a sighting there were no photographic evidence. TOI talked to past field directors but they did not confirm the sighting of a black panther. We will now add it in the list of animals during the midterm review,” said Trivedi. “I joined in August last year and thought the black panther would be mentioned in the plan. The plan is supposed to chronicle all the wildlife of a park. The management plan was compiled in 2006 but approved by the NTCA only in 2017 after many changes. Interestingly, the black panther finds no mention in the management plan (2017-2027) of Tadoba. More field staff will be deployed and they will cover a lot more area on foot for further monitoring. Apart from installing camera traps, the Tadoba management is also going in for scat collection which will be sent for DNA testing. A sighting in Tadoba, which is a dry deciduous forest, calls for attention,” said Dehradun-based Wildlife Institute of India (WII) scientist Bilal Habib. “It is a unique sighting as black panthers are generally found in evergreen forests like Western Ghats and Dandeli-Anshi in Karnataka. Tadoba field director Mukul Trivedi confirmed that the carnivore was recorded on its camera trap at 6.08pm at the same spot. As reported by TOI on Wednesday, a lucky Belgian family of five got the rare sighting of the black panther at a waterhole in Shivanzari area of the Kolsa range on Tuesday evening around 5.15pm. An expert added that this could be the first sighting in Central India too. Earlier, on three occasions, a black panther was only captured on camera traps. Nagpur: Excited over the historic first direct sighting of a black panther in Tadoba-Andhari Tiger Reserve on Tuesday, its management is launching an intensive search operation by installing more camera traps that will cover a larger area.
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