A crab hunter was mauled to death by a royal Bengal tiger when he along with two others from Kumarimari village of the Sunderbans’s Gosaba entered the core tiger reserve early Sunday morning.

Arabinda Biswas, 40, a resident of Kumirmari, was dragged away by the tiger when he was hunting for crabs in the Jhila forest of the Basirhat range.

Two fellow fishermen — Kamal Biswas and Animesh Mondal — were with him.

“We were busy hunting for crabs when a tiger pounced on Arabinda and caught him by the head. Before we tried to do something, the animal took it away inside the forest. We were not ready for such a sudden attack by a tiger,” said Animesh.

The duo immediately informed forest department staff. They all , along with a few villagers, launched a search for Arabinda inside the forest.

After the search for over an hour, the foresters discovered the mutilated body of Arabinda.

“The tiger usually hides its prey inside a bush. As the tiger caught his head, it was smashed and resulted in the death of the fisherman,” said a forester.

The foresters said one needed to get a boat license certificate or permit for fishing inside the core tiger reserve areas.

“We are continuing with awareness camps at different villages with requests to people not to enter core areas of the Sunderbans Tiger Reserve. The person who was

killed today, along with his fellow fishermen, entered the core area illegally. We have recovered the body of the crab collector from the jungle,” said Jones Justin, the deputy field director of the tiger reserve.

Sources said at least 30 fishermen or crab hunters became the prey of royal Bengal tigers in the past one-and-a-half years and the incidents increased during the Covid time as a large number of people who used to work outside returned and settled with the profession of illegal fishing or crab hunting.