HYDERABAD: Hyderbadi marksman Nawab Shafat Ali Khan, who has been facing all the flak for his son shooting down a "man-eater" tigress believed to have taken 13 human lives in last 19 months, says he is ready to take on the high and mighty campaigning against him. This comes on a day, union minister Maneka Gandhi shot a series of tweets with hashtag #Justice4TigressAvni.
In one such tweet, she attacked Khan saying "Shafat Ali Khan has killed 3 tigers, at least 10 leopards, a few elephants and 300 wild boar in Chandrapur, #Maharashtra. He is a criminal known for supplying guns to anti-nationals and for a suspected case of murder in #Hyderabad."
When contacted, the ace-shooter said: "I was merely carrying out orders of the forest department, confirmed by High Court and the Supreme Court. My job is only of a hangman." Further, he said, "No FIR is pending against me. An FIR was registered against me in 1991 under arms act and my pistol was seized. I was acquitted later."
He went onto challenge anyone to prove him guilty. "Inspite of all authorisations, if anyone is going to say anything slanderous against me and my family, I will not hesitate to take them to court, how high and mighty they are. I am not scared of man-eating tigers, do you think I will be scared of my critics?," he asked.
The 60-year-old also produced letters undersigned by chief conservator of forest(CCF) Yavatmal authorising a five member team, including Asghar Ali Khan, as Khan's team members. According to him, five sharp shooters of police department were also authorized to do the task.
Responding to other allegations if Asghar was authorised to shoot, or if the Vet experts were present at the time of incident, Khan said that as soon as the tigress was sighted at around 6.30pm Friday, Principal Chief Conservator of Forests (Wildlife) AK Mishra assembled the team of two guards, forester Muqbir Shaikh who is an expert in firing tranquilisers, Vet expert Dr Kadu and Asghar was only accompanying the team as backup.
According to him, it was Muqbir shaikh who fired the dart that was prepared with right dosage by Dr Kadu. As it takes at least 10 minutes for the drug to take effect, the tigress charged at the team.
"There was no intention to kill. It was a desperate attempt to save the tigress. Had she ran away, she could have been alive today. But the man-eater that she was, she charged at the team and in self-defence, Asghar had to fire," added Khan.
The same team of 200 frontline staffers with 100 camera traps are already in the process of tracking the cubs. "They are semi-adult and weighs around 60kgs. In a month's time, we will have them rescued. Young pigs and goats are being arranged at places where they might be spotted," he added.