Month long efforts pay off – leopard finally caught

SURAT: After a month, forest officials finally achieved success in caging a leopard here on Friday. They believe it is the same man-eater against whom a shoot at sight order was recently issued.

The leopard, a female, is about eight years old and was caged near Tuked village in Mandvi taluka. “Pug marks of the animal match with those taken near Kamlapor village. We believe that it is the same leopard which had attacked humans in Kamlapor and other parts of the taluka. We are not winding up our operation against leopards as we have information that there were still a few in the area,” said Anil Vasava, deputy conservator of forest (DCF), Mandvi.

The leopard was first spotted near Tuked village following which a cage was placed with a goat on Friday. Within minutes, the goat was killed by the leopard which then disappeared. The forest officials then placed four cages at nearby locations and were successful in caging the animal.

The leopard kept roaring in anger. It was brought to the village before being shifted to another shelter. “The animal seems to be the same one which we were looking for,” said Vasava.

Forest officials then got information that another leopard with cubs has been spotted at Kharoli near Nandpor village where a human was killed by a leopard.

The caged leopard was being continuously tracked for past one month. It started targeting humans after it was forced to move out of sugarcane fields. While hiding in the fields, the leopard only used to kill dogs, cattle or boars in the area.