Mysuru: The Forest Department has launched ‘combing’ to capture the leopard that killed four people in the Taluk and installed a very large cage (Tumkuru cage) in Horalahalli on Monday January 23.
A cage has been placed at the place where the boy was killed in the village and 120 personnel from Bandipura, and Nagarahole Park have been deployed for the operation. The task force is on patrol in Sosale Hobli range. In all, 10 teams have been formed and 13 cages have been placed in Horalalalli and various other places. Also, 16 camera traps have been installed.
CCF Malati said that thermal drones are being used for night operations. The Elephant Task Force staff also participated and the search operation has been going on for 2 days. The Deputy Commissioner has given a deadline of 15 days for sugarcane harvesting. The place where the leopard killed the boy is a wasteland with 30 acres of forest. She informed that it is being cleared. She said a rumour is rounding that DC has issued order to shoot at sight the big cat but it is false, said Malati and clarified that only the Principal Chief Conservator of Forests has the powers to issue shoot at sight.
Additional Principal Chief Conservator of Forests (Wildlife) Kumar Pushkar also visited the place and inspected the operation and gave instructions. A female leopard fell into a cage at Chidarahalli in T. Narsipura Taluk on Sunday January 22. The cage was kept because the leopard cubs were found near the sugarcane field. Officials told that it was captured in a cage when it came to see the cubs, and clarified that it was not a leopard that killed the four.
A cage was installed in a unique way to capture a man-eating leopard in Tumkuru District, earlier. Hence this model cage is called Tumkuru Cage. The cage is designed in such a way that the leopard does not know get to know that it is a cage.
Kuruburu Shanthakumar, President of Sugarcane Growers’ Association, demanded that the District In-Charge Minister S. T. Somasekhar, who is missing, should be replaced by someone else. He complained in a press conference on Monday January 23 that the Minister who is supposed to speed up the Forest Department action to prevent human-wildlife conflict is coming only if there is a programme.
A tiger that had attacked a young man in Nagarahole National Park on Saturday January 21 has been chased away by camp elephants led by Dussehra elephant ‘Arjuna’.
“The ‘backwater female’ tiger roaming around with 4 cubs in a populated area has created anxiety among the villagers. In this background, the tiger was driven to the interior of the forest by the elephants of the camp,” said the forest officials on Monday
