Nagpur, March 24 (IANS) A villager in Maharashtra’s Chandrapur district was Monday attacked and killed by a tiger - the second such incident in a month - creating panic among the people of the region, officials said. A tiger attacked Kashinath Suryavanshi, of Adyar Mendha village in Nagbhid forest range, around 11 a.m. while he was plucking leaves to make stitch them together and make plates out of them, Hrishikesh Ranjan, Brahmapuri divisional forest officer, told IANS.

“A tiger, most likely the same one, had killed a man in the FDCM (Forest Development Corporation of Maharashtra) area nearby earlier this month and its presence in the area was known to us for quite some time,” Ranjan said.

But he discounted the possibility of the tiger having turned a man-eater as it had not intruded into any human habitation so far. Chandrapur is about 150 km from here.

“The lone man went into the shadowy forest area, well inside the beaten track, to pluck mahua (maduca indica) leaves”, Ranjan said.

While tribals are allowed to keep mahua flowers for self-consumption, cutting leaves or branches of the tree for sale is strictly prohibited in the state.

This is the eighth incident of a human being killed by a tiger in the division in the last three months.

The wildlife wing of the forest department killed a ‘man-eater’ tiger in the Talodhi range of the division last December, triggering protests from wildlife activists who said the beast should have been tranquillised.

Experts also claimed that the tiger the forest department personnel killed was not a man-eater and cited instances of human killings in the subsequent months as proof of their claim.

• Kashinath