Man - animal conflict

Srinagar,  Dec 25: The Wildlife department will go for a final operation –a nightlong patrol tonight –in Shivpora to trace the leopard spotted five days ago by locals. Or else, the operation will be ended with an announcement that there was leopard in the residential area.
 The Wildlife Warden Central, Rashid Naquash who Wednesday personally visited Dhar Bagh, where the cat is feared to be hiding, said, till now there was no evidence of its presence there.
 “There’s no such evidence to substantiate its presence. No Carcass…Not even pugmark,” Naquash told Greater Kashmir.
 He said the department would suspend the operation if the cat wasn’t spotted tonight.
 Meanwhile, the fear of leopard’s presence in Shivpora continued to haunt the residents for the fifth consecutive day.
 Even though the residential colony lies in the high security zone, close to Army cantonment, the authorities remained clueless on the cat whereabouts and are about to rule out its presence there.
 The residents claim the leopard had moved to Shivpora B and taken shelter in Dhar Bagh spanning over 300 kanals of vacant land, with trees and bushes all around.
 The Wildlife department had laid some traps at Dhar Bagh.  
 Earlier, the locals had found a carcass of a dog near the land linking it with the presence of the leopard there.
 Prior to that, Tuesday night, the leopard, as per the locals, took shelter in an under construction house.
 The residents said for the past four days jackals have stopped to howl presumably due to fear of the leopard.
 Pertinently, leopards and bears have been frequently spotted in residential areas like Harwan, Brein, Nishat, which fall in the Zabarwan range. On its foothills lie Army’s 15 Corps headquarters and houses of VVIPs, including chief minister and Governor.

Lastupdate on : Fri, 25 Dec 2009 21:30:00 Makkah time
Lastupdate on : Fri, 25 Dec 2009 18:30:00 GMT
Lastupdate on : Sat, 26 Dec 2009 00:00:00 IST