The Provincial Armed Constabulary (PAC), which is normally deployed in cities to control law and order problems or to control communal riots, now has been deployed in the jungles of Faizabad.

Along with the PAC, civil police officers with a big contingent of armed men are combing the forest. Armed with heavy-bore rifles, machine guns, searchlights, dragon lights and other heavy-duty equipment, the men have been scouring the forest for the last three days.

After travelling more than 400 kilometres in the last two months, the tiger is currently roaming in a 1,000-hectare pocket of the Rampur Janank reserve forest pocket in Rudauli and Milkipur tehsils of Faizabad district.

“We have given up all efforts to trap the animal through bait or with the use of tranquilliser guns. As it has killed five persons, we have no option but to gun down the tiger,” said Faizabad district Forest Officer OP Singh.

Asked why the department’s shooters had failed to find the tiger, the DFO said there was little they could do as the thick bushes and deep woods provide the tiger a very safe cover.

According to Singh, the tiger was not an easy catch because its behaviour was unlike normal big cats. Perhaps because it is still just about two to three years old, “it does not have the usual defined habits of the tigers”, he said.