VIDEO: Leopard Terrorises Hospital Patients In Indian City Rampage

“This leopard didn’t kill anyone, it was hardly a rampage; it was merely hungry! Humans can’t take away their natural habitat & expect them to just move on! It is humans that are at fault here; by taking away the leopards land etc. Animals go where the food is, they are very territorial, taking away their land involves taking away their food supply, so of course they are going to look elsewhere for food! 

“This poor Leopard must have been scared to death, from the deafening crowd outside…the Forest Rangers or Police should have cord-end off the area & let the Leopard leave the same way it came in! The crowds were ridiculous, so I have no pity for anyone who was harmed…they shouldn’t have been so bloody nosey or so loud! I’m just praying the leopard isn’t caught by locals; if it is, they will surely make it pay, like they have with others they have captured….by burning it to death in a cage or beating it to death!! (As in the picture below) “

By Dean Nelson, New Delhi 2:51PM GMT 24 Feb 2014

As a man-eating tiger preys on villagers in the jungle, a leopard is prowling an Indian city’s streets.

Soldiers, police and wildlife experts were today hunting a leopard which walked into a hospital ward in Meerut, a large city in northern India, and caused panic among staff and patients.

The big cat was first spotted by a timber merchant who saw it emerging from a lavatory in his warehouse and alerted the police on Sunday morning.

Two people in a large crowd which gathered at the site were reported to have been attacked by the leopard after one of them lifted a plank under which it had been hiding.

It was later seen by a caretaker at the Meerut Cantonment Hospital in the heart of the city’s military area where it walked onto a ward where several men were being treated.

Staff at the hospital helped the patients escape the ward and then locked the doors to trap the leopard inside.

It managed to escape and a hunt is now under way to track it down.

“The leopard was last spotted on Monday at around 3:30am on a road near the hospital but since then there have been no sightings. We are keeping a vigil but there is a strong possibility that it has returned to its natural habitat,” said Abhishek Singh, Assistant Superintendent of Police, Meerut.

“It was hit by a tranquilizer dart but we are not sure how effective that was. The animal was scared and was running away from people and in this commotion few people were injured. We were trying to control the crowds from getting near the leopard,” he added.

This poor leopard was beaten to death by villagers!

Ashok Kumar of the Wildlife Trust of India said more leopards are straying into towns because humans are increasingly encroaching on their habitats.

“This is happening very frequently because their habitats are shrinking and they come into human habitation for food and space,” he said. “So one can not say these animals are hunting humans for food, they are merely looking for food because humans took their food source away…if someone gets in their way & makes them feel threatened; one can’t blame the animal, it’s only acting on instinct!!”

Leopard enters Meerut hospital, attacks patients: Video

Published on 24 Feb 2014

High alert has been sounded in Meerut city after a leopard entered a hospital Sunday. A police inspector and media person got injured when they ventured too close to the irritated leopard. The big cat was spotted by a caretaker as it was entering the hospital.

News Link:–http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/asia/india/10658173/Leopard-terrorises-hospital-patients-in-Indian-city-rampage.html

Eight suspected tiger poachers held near Pench Tiger Reserve

BHOPAL: Eight suspected poachers were detained with a metal trap, a knife and others implements allegedly used to electrocute big cats at Linga village of Chhindwara district late on Friday night, close to MP’s Pench Tiger Reserve, which spreads over to Maharashtra. In Maharashtra’s Chandrapur district, a striped-animal was electrocuted and chopped to 11 pieces for costly body parts a week ago.

The detention of the group assumes significance as it comes some 22 days after a warning issued by the National Tiger Conservation Authority (NTCA) that a big gang has paid advance to Katni district-based local poachers’ gang to kill tiger for body parts for big bucks in international market. In the wake of the NTCA warning, a high alert has been sounded in 42 tiger reserves across the country, including five in the state.

“We have recovered a metal trap, a knife, sharp iron rods, hammers, wires and wooden rods among other things used to kill tiger from their possession. After trapping the big cat, the modus operandi of poachers is that they put the sharp iron rod inside striped animal’s mouth to kill him,” Chhindwara divisional forest officer Ashok Kumar told TOI.

After killing the tiger, the poachers beat it up with wooden rod to loosen its skin and thereafter remove the hide with specially-designed knife, which they have recovered, he said.

Ashok said that the group was also owned one Gypsy jeep and eight motorbikes. “We believe that they had done a recee to kill tiger,” he added.

The arrested have been identified as Sanjesh of Shivpuri district and Zilendar Giri of Sarguja inChhattisgarh while Rai Singh, Dharma, Dhara, Ishwar, Jorawar and Kismat, all hail from Chhitorgarh in Rajasthan.

“We carried out searches at three places in Shivpuri,” Ashok said. He said that right now it was difficult for them to say that if the gang were members belonged to nomadic Pardhi tribe. Pardhi tribe, especially hailing from Katni district was infamous for killing wild animals for an easy living. The big poaching gangs allegedly use this tribe that is believed to have mastered the illegal art of killing wild animals across the country.

News Link:-http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/city/bhopal/Eight-suspected-tiger-poachers-held-near-Pench-Tiger-Reserve/articleshow/13537758.cms

Poacher admits to killing tiger 45 days ago

BHOPAL: A tiger was killed in Shivpuri district some 45 days ago by one of the eight poachers, who were arrested in Chhindwara district on the charge of planning to lay trap for electrocuting a big cat in Pench Tiger Reserve.

The eight accused were detained on Friday and produced in a court on Sunday after forest department officials registered cases against them at Chhindwara. Except Sanjesh who admitted to killing the striped animal in Shivpuri, all others Zilendar Giri of Sarguja in Chhattisgarh and Rai Singh, Dharma, Dhara, Ishwar, Jorawar and Kismat hailing from Chhitorgarh in Rajasthan have been sent to jail. The court sent Sanjesh in forest department remand for five days, Chhindwara divisional forest officer Ashok Kumar told TOI.

“We are going to grill Sanjesh, who hails from Shivpuri, and that is why we sought his remand. He might spill some more vital beans regarding poaching given he had been in Hoshangabad housing Satpura tiger reserve some days ago, ” Kumar said.

After Sanjesh confessed of having killed a tiger in Shivpuri, the officials are now planning to carry out searches at some places to recover the body parts of big cat. 

Two days back, the accused were detained with a metal trap, a knife and others implements used to electrocute big cat, at Linga village of Chhindwara district, close to MP’s Pench tiger reserve, which spreads over to Maharashtra.

News Link:-http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/city/bhopal/Poacher-admits-to-killing-tiger-45-days-ago/articleshow/13578572.cms