Leopard kills 7 year old girl in Anantnag

Leopard kills 7-year old girl in Anantnag

Rashid Ahmad

Srinagar, January 12, 2007

A leopard killed a 7-year old girl at Panchalthan village in the hills of Achabal in southern Anantnag district on Friday. Police said the leopard suddenly appeared outside the house of one Mohammad Yousuf Shaikh in the village, and attacked his daughter Beauty Jan.

Police said that, who was rescued by the residents by raising an alarm, however suffered critical injuries residents and died on way to hospital.

This is second such incident in the area in the past three days. Earlier on Tuesday a leopard attacked and killed a 10-year old boy at a nearby Utrusso village in the same area. The killing of children by the wild animals have caused panic and scare in the area.

Wild bears entered populated areas in many parts of Kupwara, Baramullah, Anantnag and Pulwama in the past three months. As many as five persons including a minor child were killed and over 30 wounded in the attacks by them on residents.

Last month, a black bear attacked a 70-year old person Abdul Gani Rather at Shariefabad village in Tral and injured him critical, who later died in the hospital. The residents chased the black bear and attacked hiom with lathis and stones. The irate mob later burnt the wild animal live. Four persons were arrested for killing the bear.

Two months back, a bear snatched a child in Kupwara, whose body was recovered the next morning from a nearby field. A woman in Kondabal village, around 27 km from Srinagar, was also attacked by a wild bear, who succumbed to injuries at a hospital.

Wildlife officials say that there had been a substantial increase in wild animal population in Jammu and Kashmir as poaching and hunting has stopped in Kashmir with the rise of terrorism.

They say that the human interference in the wild animal habitat has also increased and many forested areas have been denuded, which force the wild animals to stray into villages.

They say that many areas, where wild animal usually inhabit are covered under snow and these animals come down to residential areas in search of food.