Close encounter of the animal kind in Bangalore

If you are living on the city’s outskirts, think twice about going out alone in the early mornings, evenings or nights. You might just come across a leopard.

In a first of its kind, a leopard strayed close to Bangalore’s urban habitat – 17 km from the city centre – but was tragically run over by a speeding vehicle in the early hours of Monday off the NICE Road segment near Purvankara apartments between Bannerghatta Road and Kanakapura Road.

Forest department was informed at 5am. But the incident shows that as Bangalore is expanding horizontally, it is rapidly causing man-animal conflict, the leopard’s death being the latest case. Recently, a deer was rescued by villagers close by.

Fortunately, the Purvankara Apartments is not yet occupied, or it could have been worse as forest officials said the hungry feline four-year-old male carnivore was in search of prey.

Forest officials said the leopard was crossing the road, on one side of which is Bannerghatta National Park and Kalkere state forest, and on the other, BM Kaval reserve forest.

Deputy conservator of forests, Bangalore urban division, Vanashree Vipin Singh, said post mortem revealed that the leopard, protected under schedule 1 of the Wildlife Protection Act, 1972, was possibly hit a truck. Any mischief surrounding the leopard’s death has been ruled out, she said.