One-horned Rhino dies in Manas National Park, authorities refute poaching 

Talking to IANS, Vaibhav C. Mathur, director of Manas National Park and Tiger Reserve said, “It was a natural death. We have confirmed it. The horns were also recovered.The one-horned rhino whose carcass was found on Saturday was shifted to Manas from Kaziranga National Park and Tiger Reserve in 2013.“It was a male rhino around 18 years-old. Most probably the rhino died due to infighting with other wild animals. We are looking into it, Mathur said.According to the forest officer, this was the third natural death of a rhino in Manas National Park this year. One rhino fell in the hands of poachers in the month of June.Notably, a suspected rhino poacher died in a police encounter recently in Assam’s Chirang district who had been arrested earlier along the Indo-Bhutan border.Nareswar Basumatary, a poacher, was shot by Assam's Special Task Force (STF), according to the police, as he tried to escape from custody.The Wildlife Crime Control Bureau in Assam and a team from the Chirang Forest Department conducted an operation close to the border between India and Bhutan based on a top-secret tip concerning the smuggling of rhino bones and other body parts.In that operation, the authorities found rhino claws, skin, a homemade pistol, and bullets. The police also arrested two other individuals on the charges of poaching.--IANStdr/dan

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