The Tiger surge at Umred

She did not have a name back then when I made this image in Dec 2015. The place was Umred Karhandla Wildlife Sanctuary, which at that time was booming with one name, as was the rest of the country, Jai. This hunk with a Hulk like appearance, was the reason why Umred had popped up on every wildlifer’s go to list. Jai had single handedly revived the not so famous forest by giving it 9 new tigers from 3 different mates. But arguably the most famous allegiance of these was the one with the famous resident Tigress, Chandi!! They bore 4 cubs, 3 handsome males and 1 beautiful female, not to mention, they obviously had their Daddy’s looks,size and more so his bold attitude. The beautiful Tigress in the image is the female from this litter which later I learnt was named Barkha(meaning “Rain” in Hindi), maybe for her adorable looks. The rest of the three Male cubs were named, Jaichand(the largest one getting his name from his mother and father “Jai” and “Chandi”), Bahu and Bali(once again for their large size correlating them to the famous Bahubali movie). The current whereabouts of these cubs are unknown to me and I would love to hear from anyone who is aware of these Cubs’s(now all adult Tigers) current status. Jai and Jaichand both have been presumed dead as both of them mysteriously went missing, Jai in 2016 and Jaichand a couple of years later in 2018.

It was a treat to see Tiger cubs so large and bold at such a young age.