Suspected poachers killed yet again a rhino in Kaziranga National Park on Sunday and axed off its horn, which has taken the death toll of rhinos in past 47 days in Assam to 10.
The park authorities, who seem to have been groping in dark about the nexus of poachers, said that forest guards spotted a bullet-ridden body of a male mature rhino near Kawoimari forest camp in Bagori range of the park on Sunday morning.
The forest guards also recovered the cartridges of 303 rifles, which were suspected to have been used by poachers to kill the rhino.
The incident took place even after a series of measures announced by Assam forest minister Rockybul Hussain who on Saturday decided to divide Kaziranga National Park into four new divisions to increase the surveillance.
Mr Hussain had also announced a series of steps to check poaching in 2012, the year Assam lost a total of 21 rhinos to poachers. Apart from wildlife activists and various other organisations of the state, the WWF-India has also expressed deep concern about the rhino killings in Assam and increasing use of sophisticated weapons by the poachers to kill the rhinos. The WWF-India in a statement recently regretted, “Many of the rhinos killed this year in Assam were gunned down by AK rifles. Use of such lethal weapons enables poachers to kill the rhinos quickly, cut off their horns and flee before the forest guards can get to the scene.” The security agencies tipped off the state government about rhino horns being smuggled.