Tigers stalk as storms, poverty force Indians deep into mangrove forests

Parul Haldar (R), 39, whose husband died in a tiger attack during a fishing trip, her brother Nitai Mandal, 32, and her mother Lakshmi Mandal, 65, row a boat close to the Sundarban Tiger Reserve (STR) forest near the Satjelia island in the Sundarbans, India, November 20, 2020. According to the Sundarban Tiger Reserve's director, Tapas Das, five people have been killed by tigers in India's Sundarbans since April. REUTERS/Anushree Fadnavis

SATJELIA, India (Reuters) - On a warm November afternoon, Parul Haldar balanced precariously on the bow of a small wooden dinghy, pulling in a long net flecked with fish from the swirling brown river.

Just behind her loomed the dense forest of the Sundarbans, where some 10,000 square km of tidal mangroves straddle India's northeastern coastline and western Bangladesh and open into the Bay of Bengal.