Leopard chases farmer & wife riding bike in Junnar

PUNE: Mahendra Waman, a farmer, and his wife could not believe their eyes nor contain their fear when they noticed a leopard emerging from the woods and chasing their motorcycle along the Wadgaon Anand to Kalewadi road at Pimpalwandi in Junnar taluka on Saturday evening. It was around dusk when the couple were on the road and the woman noticed the leopard. She alerted her husband. Waman then opened the throttle of his motorcycle and sped for almost 100m to throw the leopard off track .

When the leopard continued to chase them, the couple raised an alarm to draw attention from nearby villagers to scare away the big cat.

Help came from the nearby villages when people responded to their cries and rushed to the spot, prompting the leopard to retreat.

In the man-animal conflict zone of Junnar, about 80km from Pune, this is the third incident of its kind in the last three weeks. Local villagers feel it has become dangerous to venture out on the roads, particularly during the night hours.

A forest officer said he had reports about other motorcyclists being chased by the leopard.

"Such behaviour of the big cat is against natural instinct. We are trying to find out the possible reasons. Some fifteen years ago, a female leopard was targeting people in a similar manner. It was later found that her cubs were killed in a road accident," a senior forest official said

Waman told TOI, “The incident has deeply disturbed me. Had I not increased my bike’s speed, the animal would have killed us. The forest department should place a trap to cage the wild animal at the earliest.”

Vidya Athreya, a biologist with the Wildlife Conservation Society India who has done research projects on leopards, said, “It is unusual behaviour for the animal. We don’t have scientific information to explain how the animal can behave in this manner. Ordinarily, they keep themselves away from people. The forest department and experts need to study this behaviour to find out the exact reason.”

Ajay Deshmukh, veterinary officer of Manikdoh Leopard Rescue Centre (MLRC), said similar type of attacks have been reported in the past as well. “In the past, a female leopard had started attacking commuters in a similar fashion. Later, we came to know that her two cubs had died in a road accident and therefore she had started chasing motorcycles,” Deshmukh said.

He said the forest department has been taking awareness programmes in the tehsil to appraise them about the leopard’s behaviour, preventing measures and so on.