Straying leopard panics farmers; labourers in Waluj

Chhatrapati Sambhajinagar:

An air of insecurity has prevailed amongst the farmers and farm labourers of Waluj after a few women farm labourers claimed to have seeing a leopard moving in the Kham River bed on Saturday morning. The leopard movement has been spotted after a gap of one year. They demanded the Department of Forest (DoF) to provide security to them.

It so happened that the women labourers Shantabai More, Kavita Nikam, Pratika Mali and others were heading towards the farm of Ramesh Bhujang for agricultural work on Saturday. While they were walking through the river bed, they got panicked on seeing leopard like animal straying around. They screamed for help and rushed to the nearby farm locality and informed resident Uday Chavan about the animal. Chavan then informed the villagers. Hence few youths along with lathis then searched the whole vicinity, but was in vain. However, the youths spotted pug marks of one wild animal. The women fear that the leopard may have strayed into the nearby sugarcane farm.

One year ago, one uncle and nephew while watering the crops in the farm during night hours had spotted a leopard in Narayanpur.

Chavan then informed the Daulatabad’s forest guard and demanded security for the villagers. He also shared the photo of pug marks of the wild animal with DoF. Meanwhile, the farm labourers and farmers are panicked as they have to visit their farms for work as the monsoon is fast approaching.