Four newborn tiger cubs were killed due to 'suffocation' under the weight of mother tigress in Ranchi's Bhagwan Birsa Biological Park, a zoo official said on Tuesday.

The tigress Gauri gave birth to four cubs on May 10 but it turned over the newborn cubs and under the weight of the mother all four cubs died, the zoo veterinarian OP Sahu told PTI.

"The mother did not have child-caring experience. Gauri could not understand that she turned over her newborn cubs. The cubs died of suffocation under the weight of the mother on May 11," he said.

Dr MK Gupta of Ranchi Veterinary Collge, who carried out the postmortem on Monday, told PTI, "It was evident that all four cubs died due to suffocation under mother's weight. We found pressure marks on skin of the cubs." Currently, Ranchi zoo has two tigers and six tigresses. "It was first delivery of 10-year-old Gauri and ironically tiger cubs are not able to see at least 15 days of their birth," Sahu said, adding that a similar incident had happened at the zoo some years back.

He said that they had taken the opinion to segregate the cubs from the mother. "But, the survival rate of cubs in such cases is very low," he said.

The cubs were fathered by Jawa, an eight-year-old male tiger, Sahu added.

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