A year and a half ago, young tigress Zeenat had gone AWOL from Odisha’s Similipal sanctuary for 21 days, travelling 300km across Jharkhand and Bengal and giving wildlife authorities sleepless nights.

She has now put a smile on every face in Similipal and beyond, having given birth to four healthy cubs that have lifted the sanctuary’s tiger population to 44.

More importantly, she has raised hopes that her cubs can help solve a problem that has blighted Similipal in recent years: Its preponderance of melanistic tigers, the result of a genetic disorder caused by excessive inbreeding.

Melanistic tigers have thick black stripes placed so close together that they cover up most of the brown background, making the animals appear almost black. These tigers are prone to disease, infection and low fertility.

It was to break this chain of inbreeding that the then three-year-old Zeenat and another tigress, two-and-a-half-year-old Jamuna, had been brought to Similipal from the Kharwa range of the Tadoba Andhari Tiger Reserve in Maharashtra in November 2024.

Forest officials on Tuesday said Zeenat’s cubs, sired by the melanistic male Tiger T12, seemed normal but they could not be entirely certain until they had grown a year old.

“She delivered four cubs 20 days ago. Both Zeenat and her cubs are healthy and fine. We are closely monitoring their movements. Special squads have been deployed for their security,” Odisha forest and environment minister Ganesh Ram Singh Khuntia said.

An image captured by a trap camera showed Zeenat carrying one of her cubs in her mouth, PTI reported.

Weeks after arriving in Similipal on November 13, 2024, Zeenat had slipped out of the sanctuary in early December and ventured into Bengal via Jharkhand. She kept moving through the Jhargram, Purulia and Bankura districts, leading teams of forest officials into a merry dance.

A 21-day chase ended with her being tranquillised on December 29 afternoon near Gopalpur village in Bankura.

After two days under observation at Calcutta’s Alipore Zoo, Zeenat headed back to Similipal on December 31.

There, she was released in a one-hectare, soft-release enclosure on the Jamuna meadow. Encouraged by the dominant male T12’s show of interest in her, forest officials released Zeenat into the wild in mid-April last year.

Sources said the new mother was now unlikely to leave the sanctuary again for at least two to three years.She has been seen marking her territory in the tigerreserve.

The birth of the four cubs “not only signifies an increase in the tiger population in the state but also stands as an excellent testament to our administrative foresight in protecting biodiversity and creating a safe and robust habitat for wildlife”, chief minister Mohan Charan Majhi wrote on social media.