Today in the same series, we talk about another poacher who has unleashed terror through tiger hunting in central India and the Gondwana plateau.
This person’s name is Ajit Pardhi. He is also said to be the leader of the Pardhi gang. In reality, the Pardhis are an Adivasi community found from Katni and Dindori in Madhya Pradesh to the Chhattisgarh border areas and across the Vidarbha region. They are traditional hunters and are also known as Baheliyas. In this gang, entire families are involved in the activity, and these people are experts in catching tigers using “leg-hold traps.”
Ajit Pardhi was born into the Adivasi Baheliya/pardhi community in Katni district of Madhya Pradesh and has been involved in wildlife hunting since the early days of his life. He has been jailed around four times in different cases so far. His first arrest and conviction were in a tiger poaching case. After that, this notorious and hardened criminal made Chandrapur his base, and according to his confessions, he was directly involved in the hunting of around 30 tigers there, while many more were killed with the help of other groups.
He was first caught in Chandrapur in 2013 but escaped from custody. Recently, the Madhya Pradesh State Tiger Strike Force brought him from Chandrapur jail to Madhya Pradesh on a production warrant in connection with a tiger poaching case in Pench. Currently, he is serving a five-year sentence in Chandrapur jail. He has been involved in tiger hunting by forming a network along with his wife, brother, and children.
Earlier, another poacher named Kattu Pardhi also ran his own gang, but he is no longer active. A direct connection between these two ruthless poachers Kalya Bavariya and Ajit Pardhi has not been firmly established so far. However, the reality is that both these nomadic Adivasi communities have played a significant role in the elimination of tigers from India’s forests.
Once again, I urge the Government of India and the state governments to make such arrangements for these poachers that they are not able to come out of jail again, because the chances of them joining the mainstream are extremely low. If they are set free once more, it will be a matter of serious concern for wildlife.
The reality is that these two gangs have killed between 150 and 200 tigers and leopards in the past few years.
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