Dogs behind Sitapur attacks, says WWF

LUCKNOW: The preliminary investigation done by a World Wildlife Fund (WWF) team has confirmed that dogs were behind the attacks on children in Sitapur villages on Wednesday.
The team visited six spots where packs of dogs attacked. The team found no traces of any wild animal, including hyena or wolf, at the spots .

No dens of hyenas or wolves were found in any village where children were killed or attacked.

'The study of photographs of children attacked clearly showed that attacks were carried out by the dogs. Had any carnivore like wolf or hyena attacked then a larger mass from the body of the victim would have been eaten up and only bones would have been found,' WWF team members said.

District forest officer Anirudh Pandey said the WWF team will study the pattern of attacks in Sitapur since November last year, when the first attack occurred, along with the study of the geographical pattern of the areas where the attacks took place. Thereafter, WWF team will submit a detailed report to the district administration.

DM Sitapur Sheetal Verma said a team of veterinary scientists from Bareilly has also arrived in the district. "They have come to study the behavioural pattern of the animals here and will submit the findings to the forest officials and the state government. No attack has been reported in the last two days," she said.