Jaipur, Nov. 15: A tiger relocated from the Ranthambhore tiger reserve to the Sariska wildlife park was found dead last night and another has been missing for the past 15 days, making wildlife watchers wonder if park authorities were well prepared for the big-cat revival experiment.

Five tigers have been taken to the Sariska forest from Ranthambhore. The relocation started in 2008, when the now dead male was brought to the reserve. ST-1, as this tiger was identified, was three-and-a-half years old then.

Last night, it was found dead by officials who were hunting for another missing tiger and accidentally stumbled upon the decomposed carcass after trying to track feeble radio-collar signals.

All five tigers that had been relocated — the last one came this year — had radio collars. The 881sqkm Sariska had lost all its tigers by 2005, which necessitated the Rs 1.5-crore relocation.

Today, officials in Sariska were tightlipped when asked what could have killed the animal. Sources in the reserve said the tiger must have been dead for at least five days as the carcass had decomposed.

H.M. Bhatia, the state chief wildlife warden, said: “Initial investigations suggest the tiger must have got into a territorial fight with another tiger, which may have caused its death.”

But park sources and wildlife activists have picked holes in this reason.

Conservationist Dharmender Khandal, who runs an NGO in Ranthambhore, said: “How can the officials speak of territorial fights? Sariska is more than 800sqkm and there is enough space for every tiger…. The official version of territorial fight does not really hold.”

Khandal said Sariska authorities were unprepared to tackle the tiger relocation. Under the relocation plan, 11 villages were to be shifted from the park’s core area. Till now, only a small village has been shifted.

Chief minister Ashok Gehlot visited Sariska today and said he would wait for the post-mortem report to take action.