Elusive male leopard trapped in T Narsipura after 22 days of operations

After 22 days of day and night special operation by 15 teams including over 150 personnel of forest department, at last the elusive leopard is trapped in the huge cage which resembled cowshed at the Mallikarjunaswamy hill in T Narsipura taluk of Mysuru district on Friday morning.

Leaving a sigh of relief at last, Malathi Priya, conservator of Forest (Mysuru circle) and Kamala Karikalan, DCF Mysuru division, who led the operation, confirmed this.

Kamala said, "It is a seven to eight year old male leopard weighing around 80kgs. At around 4.30am on Friday morning, the leopard entered the huge cage which resembled the cow shed, which was brought from Tumkur for the purpose. It was around 10am when our staff went to check the cage, it was found trapped. The leopard was shifted to Bannerghatta zoo around 2pm after permission from Principal Chief Conservator of Forests (PCCF), Wildlife, Rajiv Ranjan."

She added, "It is the same leopard which they were looking for. It is confirmed with the images of the trap cameras that it was the same one which had killed 22 year old Manjunath at Ukkalagere near Mallikarjunaswamy hill on October 31. S Kebbehundi where 22 year old Meghana was killed on December 1 was just over 4km from . So going by close distance between two incidents, and similarities of pug marks of the leopard in both the sites, and also since the way it had attacked Meghana was similar to attack on Manjunath, we had suspected that it might be the same leopard which had killed Meghana too. But we did not have any images of a trap camera at S Kebbehundi to confirm it.

A shoot at sight order was passed after both these incidents which had occurred within one month. PCCF and APCCF Kumar Pushkar had personally visited and personally monitored the operation.

As many as over 500 people gathered to have a sight of the leopard which had created anxious moments among people of T Narsipura taluk.

Malathi Priya said, "The credit goes to each personnel of the teams who strived relentlessly. While we had placed 47 trap cameras and 16 cages, they will be there for some more time.

When asked if they had sought for any special leopard task force for TNarsipur, she said "We have not sought for any such task force. However the local forest officials of T Narsipura taluk will continue to be alert. People need not be anxious."

Ever since the special operation began, the leopard was sighted nine times in the trap cameras in Mallikarjunaswamy hill. It was sighted once on December 21, once on December 16, twice on December 17 and December 18, twice on December 10, December 8 morning, December 5 morning and December 3 night. It was sighted thrice in the high quality thermal camera with drone in Mallikarjunaswamy hill from December 7 to December 9.

Followed by incidents of injuries to two other people due to leopard attacks in the taluk, the pressure by people of the village and local elected representatives had mounted on forest officials.

Ever since the special operation began on December 2, this is the fifth leopard rescued in T Narsipura taluk including three cubs and a two year old female leopard. Also this is the 25th leopard rescued in Mysuru division since April this year including eight in T Narsipura taluk.

Caption:
Elusive leopard trapped in a cage which resembled a cowshed at Mallikarjunaswamy hill at T Narsipura taluk of Mysuru district on Friday morning.