Gondiya: The endless craze for selfies seems to have reached sadistic heights. In a shocking display of cruelty, 5-6 youths in Gondia dragged an injured eight-month-old leopard cub to click a ‘selfie’ showing them as ‘fearless’, since they had the baby feline by its tail. The cub, which was seriously injured in the incident, succumbed to the assault on January 7, a day after it was rescued by forest officials and was being treated at Kohmara village.
A video of the incident, which occurred in the village of Koylaribit, near the Navegaon-Nagzira Tiger Reserve in Gondia forest division of Vidarbha region, has gone viral on social media platforms. The video shows villagers assaulting the hapless cub and a villager dragging it across the open field and flinging it around. The villagers clicked pictures and took ‘selfies’ while the dehydrated cub lay on the ground and posted them on social media, a forest official said.
The video and photographs were forwarded to the forest officials, which is how they were alerted about the incident. Forest officials said three persons have been held in connection with what appears to be a barbaric torture of the wild cat. The accused have been identified as Prakash Puram, Lokesh Kapgate and Asif Gondeel, who were produced in a local court and sent to police custody till Friday.
Gondia deputy conservator of forest Yuvraj S told PTI that on receiving information about the leopard cub being thrashed by locals, forest officials rushed to the spot and found it unconscious. “We immediately provided necessary medication to the injured cub, which was suffering from diarrhoea, and kept it under observation,” he said. “During a search, we also found a sub-adult leopard, aged around one-and-a-half years. We took it under our care and provided necessary medication, after which it was released in the forest,” he said.