A CORRESPONDENT
DIBRUGARH: The man-animal conflict has been rising tremendously in upper Assam due to shrinking of forest covers. On Friday, a leopard was caged in the Khowang area in Dibrugarh. Pankaj Baruah, a villager hailing from Khowang’s Nahazar Sonowal village, made the iron cage after the forest department failed to provide them with an iron cage to trap big cats.
This is an illegal practice, but villagers made such cages to trap leopards to protect their children and domestic animals from the animal.
“The leopard has been creating terror in our village for the last several days. I placed the cage and the animal was successfully caged on Friday. Last Saturday, a black panther was successfully trapped in my cage,” said Pankaj Baruah.
He said, “The forest department could not provide us a cage because they have only one cage. We have made such a cage to trap the big cats that are frequently venturing into our village in search of food.”
Meanwhile, the forest department reached the spot and took the leopard with them, and later they released them to Joypur Reserve Forest.
Leopards take refuge in tea garden areas, and sometimes they attack workers when they are busy plucking tea leaves.
Due to shrinking of forest covers, leopards are venturing into human settlements in search of food, and many a time they have taken away pet dogs and other domestic animals from people’s houses.
Talking to The Sentinel, Dibrugarh divisional forest officer B. V. Sandeep said, “We have taken the leopard in our custody and later released the animal into the wild. It’s a major problem in tea gardens and village areas, and to tackle this issue, we have issued an advisory to garden management. We are organising an awareness programme in the village as well as tea garden areas against such issues.”
“Most of the time the people become impatient, and to save their cattle and domestic animals, they do such kinds of things. Sometimes, the people harm the animal, but we are constantly creating awareness to not harm the animals,” the DFO said.
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