Chief minister Mamata Banerjee on Monday asked chief secretary Manoj Pant to request his Odisha counterpart to send a team of foresters to rescue another tiger suspected to be roaming in Jharkhand's Chandil, which borders Purulia.

She pointed out that the Bengal forest department had rescued tigress Zeenat, also from Odisha, recently, and seemed to suggest another tiger from Odisha had entered Bengal.

"I want to communicate with the Odisha government through our chief secretary. You (chief secretary) should ask the Odisha government to rescue the tiger and take it back," said Mamata at Sagar Island during a programme to welcome 95 Indian fishermen who had returned from a Bangladesh jail.

"I don't want to blame the Odisha government, but I am requesting them to rescue the tiger and take it back," she added.

A senior forest official clarified they had information about a tiger in Jharkhand and was currently located in Chandil, around 50km from the Bengal border. Pugmarks sighted made foresters believe the animal could be a tiger.

However, foresters so far are not sure if the suspected tiger is from Odisha.

Mamata explained that during the operation to rescue Zeenat, who escaped from Odisha's Similipal Tiger Reserve, people in five districts of Bengal experienced panic. Zeenat was finally captured in a Bankura forest on the afternoon of December 29.

Mamata, who praised her foresters for successfully capturing Zeenat unharmed, criticised her Odisha counterpart for failing to manage tigers.

"After crossing five jungles and roaming through five districts of Bengal, our foresters finally captured the tigress (Zeenat). As soon as we rescued her, they asked us to send her back immediately, so we did. Now, another tiger has arrived...," said Mamata. "They (Odisha government) do not have proper facilities to house these tigers. If they don't have resources, they should ask us to permanently house the tigers in Bengal."

A senior forester said that the Jharkhand government had installed various trap cameras in the forests in the Chandil-Dalma region, but no tiger has been captured in them so far.

"We have to wait until we get a clear picture of the animal to determine if it is a tiger or a leopard," said the official.

Still, reports of the suspected tiger’s movement in Jharkhand, near Bengal's Purulia, have led Bengal foresters to increase vigil.

"We have deployed foresters to increase vigilance along the Jharkhand border in Purulia," said S. Kulandaivel, chief conservator of forests (CCF), Western Circle.

This suspected tiger is not wearing a radio collar, unlike Zeenat, making the task of tracking it more difficult for foresters.

"You can understand our plight.... We have to wait until the Jharkhand officials capture pictures of it on trap cameras," said a forester.

Jamshedpur divisional forest officer Saba Alam Ansari, who also holds charge of Seraikela-Kharsawan forest division under which Chandil falls, admitted no tiger was seen either on cameras or by forest guards, officials or villagers so far.

"The last sight of pugmarks was at Pata (Chandil) on Saturday,” added Ansari.

Reports suggested a calf was recently killed.