Two big cats on the prowl have robbed sleep of residents in a Chennai suburb and in villages of Erode district in western Tamil Nadu for the last two months. When villages in Chengalpettu near Chennai alerted forest and revenue officials of sighting a leopard, the authorities rejected it terming the people might have mistook stray dogs for leopard. The fact that Chengalpattu was a Chennai suburb made them treat leopard sightings as exaggeration.
But when four goats disappeared from the villages and an IT engineer by Nagarathinam himself saw the leopard, the officials were left with no alternative but to take the warning seriously. They installed four camera-traps in the villages where the leopard was sighted. On Friday, the Forest officials were in for a surprise as the camera installed at Vallam, hardly 5 km from Chengalpattu caught a grown-up leopard moving around the region. It is a healthy male leopard aged between five and ten, according to forest officials. Efforts are on to trap the big cat with a cage and to translocate the animal to some reserve forests far away from Chengalpattu.
Villagers in Chengalpattu have not slept for the last two months. “We have formed squads and move around villages to keep the leopard away from residential areas. Normal life come to a standstill by sunset for fear of the leopard,” said Shivaji, a pan shop owner in Vallam.
Dr Nandita Krishna, noted environmentalist and director of CPR Environmental Education Centre, Chennai, told The Pioneer that the leopard has not trespassed into the villages. “It is the human beings who have encroached into the reserve forests. The Chengalpattu and Vandalloor regions were known by the name Puliyoor (which means the land of tigers and leopards). The British as well as the natives were competing with each other to hunt and kill tigers and leopards. The forest cover in the area has come down drastically,” said Dr Krishna.
Naturalists and animal lovers are worried over the intention of the officials. The shooting down by Tamil Nadu Special Police of a tiger, nick named ‘man eater’ by forest officials in The Nilgiris early this year is still fresh in their memory. “The authorities as well as the locals are in the dark about the characteristics of leopards and tigers. The leopards do not attack human beings. These big cats target only goats or rabbits. It is only as a means of self- defence they turn against human beings,” said S Jayachandran, convenor, Tamil Nadu Green Movement.
He said poaching of leopards and tigers is rampant in Tamil Nadu. “This year we helped the authorities to seize three tiger and leopard skins and ivory. Poaching goes uninterrupted in Tamil Nadu forests for shortage of staff,” said Jayachandran.People in Erode are in a state of shock following Thursday’s killing of a forest staff allegedly by a leopard on the prowl. Cages with live baits have been installed in the villages from where leopard sightings have been reported.
The data furnished by the Tamil Nadu Forest Department is not encouraging. According to the Forest Department, the State’s reserve forest constitute only 14.9 per cent of total geographic area where international norms stipulate that it should be 30 per cent.