Nagpur, May 24 (IANS): A most dominant male Tiger of Tadoba Andhari Tiger Reserve, popularly called 'Waghdoh' died of old age peacefully in the forest of Sinala under Chandrapur range.

The petrified dead body of around 18 years old tiger was recovered on Monday morning by the forest rangers. Having grown old, Waghdoh (T33) was driven out of Tadoba Reserve by the younger tigers in 2015.

The giant beast had then settled in Devada forests of the buffer zone and then moved to Junona as it grew old. It has been sighted in the coal mines of Durgapur and forests around Sinala and Masala villages under Chandrapur forest range since the first week of this month. Forest department was closely monitoring its movement and had detected that it had grown sluggish with age.

Waghdoh was the prime suspect for the death of a shepherd from Sinala village whose mutilated body was found in the forest nullah last week. While camera traps were set and patrolling was intensified to track its movement, its body was found in the forest close to Sinala, which is under process for allocation as a coal block to WCL.

Forest officials including CCF, Chandrapur, Prakash Lonkar along with other officials rushed to the spot.

The dead body was shifted after inquest formalities to Transit Treatment Centre (TTC) for postmortem. Autopsy was performed by a team of veterinary doctors, Dr Ravikant Khobragade, Dr Kundan Podchalwar and Dr Pravir Damle in presence of NTCA representative Bandu Dhotre and PCCF representative, Mukesh Bhandakkar.