<p>A male leopard was found dead on the top of an electric pole at a farmland in Mallaram village, 18 kilometres from Nizamabad, in Telangana on Monday morning. <br /><br />The leopard appeared to have been caught in electrical cables and got electrocuted sometime during Sunday night. <br /><br />Though forest officials in Nizamabad admitted that there were sightings of the wild cat in areas surrounding the forest, they ruled out the hand of poachers in the incident. <br /><br />“Leopards can drag their kill to the treetop, but it surprises us that the animal had climbed such a tall electrical poll,” Prasad, a forest department staff, told local media. <br /><br />Villagers’ hand<br /><br />“Irate villagers could have killed the animal and hung it on the poll, but even that seems impossible (due to the possibility of electrocution),” he said. <br /><br />Forest officials took the help of the local electricity department to bring down the dead cat and sent it for post-mortem. <br /><br />They said the cause of death could only be known after the post-mortem. <br /><br />Residents of Mallaram, however, maintain silence over the death of the wild cat. <br /><br />None of them, in fact, came forward with information on sighting the leopard on Sunday. In July 2016, a partially decomposed carcass of a female leopard and her cub were found in Tenagadapa reserve forest near Abbugudem village in Khammam district. <br /><br />A post-mortem of the carcasses later revealed that the animals were poisoned. <br /><br />The carcasses were then sent to the Laboratory for Conservation of Endangered Species (LaCONES) and Centre for Cellular and Molecular Biology (CCMB) here for post-mortem.<br /><br />One of the paws of the leopard had also been sawed off allegedly by poachers. <br /><br /></p>
<p>A male leopard was found dead on the top of an electric pole at a farmland in Mallaram village, 18 kilometres from Nizamabad, in Telangana on Monday morning. <br /><br />The leopard appeared to have been caught in electrical cables and got electrocuted sometime during Sunday night. <br /><br />Though forest officials in Nizamabad admitted that there were sightings of the wild cat in areas surrounding the forest, they ruled out the hand of poachers in the incident. <br /><br />“Leopards can drag their kill to the treetop, but it surprises us that the animal had climbed such a tall electrical poll,” Prasad, a forest department staff, told local media. <br /><br />Villagers’ hand<br /><br />“Irate villagers could have killed the animal and hung it on the poll, but even that seems impossible (due to the possibility of electrocution),” he said. <br /><br />Forest officials took the help of the local electricity department to bring down the dead cat and sent it for post-mortem. <br /><br />They said the cause of death could only be known after the post-mortem. <br /><br />Residents of Mallaram, however, maintain silence over the death of the wild cat. <br /><br />None of them, in fact, came forward with information on sighting the leopard on Sunday. In July 2016, a partially decomposed carcass of a female leopard and her cub were found in Tenagadapa reserve forest near Abbugudem village in Khammam district. <br /><br />A post-mortem of the carcasses later revealed that the animals were poisoned. <br /><br />The carcasses were then sent to the Laboratory for Conservation of Endangered Species (LaCONES) and Centre for Cellular and Molecular Biology (CCMB) here for post-mortem.<br /><br />One of the paws of the leopard had also been sawed off allegedly by poachers. <br /><br /></p>
