Wildlife experts suspect that Chalisgaon leopard could have been 'translocated'

Even as forest teams from around five districts are busy carrying out a combing operation in a five-kilometre radius near Chalisgaon, Jalgoan to either trap or shoot the leopard, which has so far killed six people, wildlife experts state that they suspect that this leopard could have been 'translocated' from a different area, as a similar situation had unfolded 12 years ago.

The fact that locals from Varkhed village and other villages including Londhe where the leopard has been spotted frequently and even attacked people, claimed that they have never heard or faced any leopard conflict for years now only makes the suspicion of experts stronger.

“In 2005 a female leopard was trapped in Junnar Forest Division and it was released more than 200 km away in Yaval Wildlife Sanctuary. When she was captured in Chalisgaon, she had travelled 90 km in the direction of Junnar and was responsible for many attacks on people in areas which had never reported human-leopard conflict before,” shared Wildlife biologist Dr Vidya Athreya adding that the situation unfolding currently at Chalisgaon seems very similar to what they faced in 2005 and there are chances that it could be a translocated leopard.

Athreya who has been working on measures to mitigate human leopard interactions shared that their own study had indicated that translocation ended up increasing leopard attacks on people in the vicinity of the release sites as these big cats have homing instincts and want to return back to their origin and while doing that they end up entering areas they do not know about and there is always a chance of conflict occurring.

“We have data that around Junnar between 2001 to 2003 the leopard attack rose to 17 per year from an average of 4 per year for the around eight year period due to rampant translocation,” she said adding that the forest department will need to put its foot down and stop these illegal translocations.

Another forest official who has been using scientific approach in his own jurisdiction to mitigate human-leopard conflict shared that several forest division accross Maharashtra are involved in illegal releases of leopards. "if a leopard is spotted or there is a killing of livestock or human in a particular area there is lot of pressure on the Range Forest Officer (RFO) from locals and politicians to trap the leopard and ensure it is not released in the same area,” he said adding that in such scenario the RFO’s trap the leopard and at night travel to the areas on border districts or even different division and release the leopard there.

Some of the officials also shared that this leopard was not getting trapped despite over 10 trap cages being set up, which also indicated that it has been trapped earlier and know about trap cages. 

A senior forest department official who is currently involved in the combing operations and himself has helped trap leopards that have entered human dominated areas shared that after speaking to the locals he too began suspecting that the leopard could have been translocated.

“Its high time that Chief Wildlife Warden comes up with a proper policy on leopard translocation as it needs to be ensured that forest department stop such practises, which is done mostly under political pressure. Human-animal interaction is only going to increase in the coming days and it needs to be dealt scientifically,” he said.