High drama as leopard gets stuck inside tunnel

The leopard terrorising Aarey Milk Colony for the past few months made another appearance on Tuesday morning,only to get stuck inside a small tunnel located below a lane within the colony.

The leopard terrorising Aarey Milk Colony for the past few months made another appearance on Tuesday morning,only to get stuck inside a small tunnel located below a lane within the colony. The leopard was finally tranquilised at 8.30pm and later taken to the Sanjay Gandhi National Park for release. For over eight hours,forest officials an the local police tried every trick in the book,including bursting fire-crackers at one end of the tunnel to putting fresh meat at its entrance,to make the leopard come out.

A local who was walking through the area saw the leopard and raised an alarm. Probably frightened at the loud noises,the leopard ran into the tunnel below the road where he has been hiding since, said a local police officer. Forest officials claim the leopard,who is around two and a half years old,might have got frightened by the loud noises made by the locals.

Senior Inspector Laxman Tonpe said: Immediately after getting to know about the leopard,we alerted the forest officials who came with a cage and tranquiliser guns to lure the big cat out. Meanwhile,locals thronged the spot to catch a glimpse of the leopard.

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The tunnel is not straight and is slightly curved because of which it has become difficult for the leopard to find a way out of either end of the tunnel. We have installed a cage with a trapdoor at one end of the tunnel and are igniting fire-crackers and making noises at the other end in the hope that it would run the other way and get trapped in the cage, said another forest official.

Sanjay Gandhi National Park director P N Munde said,Our intention is to lure the leopard out so that he can be safely taken to the national park and released. Here,there is the danger of the leopard being attacked by the locals.

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leopard