GUWAHATI
A woman who became a household name in Mizoram after killing a tiger in self-defence in 1978, died on July 19 after battling cancer for several months.
Zadingi, believed to be the only woman in India to have struck a tiger down with an axe, was 72.
Reports in July 1978 said the tiger attacked her when she had gone to a jungle near Buarpui, her home in central Mizoram’s Lunglei district, with her companions to collect firewood. She was three months pregnant then.
Recounting the incident later, she said she had no time to flee when the tiger pounced upon her. Reflexively, she sidestepped as the tiger leapt, and swung her axe with all her might.
Zadingi months before her death | Photo Credit: Special Arrangement
The axe caught the tiger mid-air and the blow was so powerful that the blade penetrated the skull, killing the tiger almost instantly.
Zadingi, 24 years old then, became a local icon of bravery and her feat was recognised by the President of India in 1980.
Locals said she would often feel sorry for killing a “creature of god” and advocated wildlife conservation. Tigers have rarely been sighted in Mizoram since the 1980s.
Lunglei adjoins Mamit district, which houses the 500 sq. km Dampa Tiger Reserve. It is one of the few tiger reserves in India without any resident striped cat.
Wildlife officials in Mizoram said no tiger has been sighted in Dampa for almost three years. The last tigers recorded were “visitors” from across the India-Bangladesh border adjoining the tiger reserve.
Dampa was given the status of a tiger reserve in 1994 after four of the felines were recorded in the protected area that year. Dampa, however, has one of the highest populations of clouded leopards.
