Trapped in room with leopard, dog has lucky escape from jaws of death

A pet dog found itself trapped with a leopard inside the store room of a house for more than four hours at Nailady in Brahmavar taluk of Udupi district in the wee hours of Sunday.

The incident occurred at the house belonging to Taramma Shetty and her son Agnesh Shetty.

After one and a half hours of operation by the forest department officials, the leopard was trapped in a cage and later released into the forest.

According to forest officials, the dog probably wanted to escape from the leopard and entered the store room of the house. But, the big cat followed it inside.

There was lot of sound in the room when the leopard tried to catch its prey, waking up the residents. On seeing a leopard in the store room, they quickly bolted it from outside at around 4.30 am.

Forest officials, led by range forest officer Chidanandappa, rushed to the spot.

A cage was placed near the door of the store room and it was fully covered with nets and plastic sheets, to ensure that the leopard does not leap out through the roof.

When the door of the store room was opened, it jumped into the cage, at the end of a 90-minute operation. The leopard was released into the forest, after veterinarians did a check-up at the veterinary clinic at Saibrakatte.

The dog suffered injuries on its neck in the leopard attack.

Residents said incidents of leopards straying into Billadi and nearby villages had increased in the last few years.

A similar incident, of a dog and leopard being trapped in the toilet of a house, was reported from a house at Kadaba taluk in Dakshina Kannada district last month.