Published: Friday, May 4, 2012, 8:00 IST
As soon as the sun sets, Shivare near Niphad, about 35km from Nashik, begins to resemble a ghost village. There’s no one in sight. The air hangs heavy with fearful anticipation. Women and children shut themselves in their houses; men huddle together, also indoors, at a place close to the fields. And then, they wait. At the slightest sound, the youth hope on to their bikes and head for the traps, hoping to find a man-eater.
It's been seven days since a five-year-old, Pallavi Sanap, was snatched by a leopard from under her grandfather's nose. Just 26 days before that, a one-year-old boy, Durgesh Gosavi, was dragged away by a leopard to the fields nearby. Cattle, dog, sheep, not a thing has been spared in the village of Shivare.
“What happened that evening was unimaginable,” recalls Ramnath Sanap, Pallavi’s grandfather, who blames himself for letting her out of sight for just a few minutes. “It was dark and Pallavi was complaining of stomachache. She wanted to go to the toilet. Here, we defecate in the open. So, I took her barely 5ft away from the hut. She asked me to give her some medicine to help relieve her pain. I was sitting on my haunches some 3ft away from her and was thinking about what to do. When I turned back to talk to her, she was missing. I knew it right then that she had been taken by a leopard,” says Sanap, as he chokes back tears.
Pallavi’s shocked parents look on helplessly as Sanap says his wife suffered a breakdown and is under treatment.
“What happened that evening was unimaginable,” recalls Ramnath Sanap, Pallavi’s grandfather, who blames himself for letting her out of sight for just a few minutes. “It was dark and Pallavi was complaining of stomachache. She wanted to go to the toilet. Here, we defecate in the open. So, I took her barely 5ft away from the hut. She asked me to give her some medicine to help relieve her pain. I was sitting on my haunches some 3ft away from her and was thinking about what to do. When I turned back to talk to her, she was missing. I knew it right then that she had been taken by a leopard,” says Sanap, as he chokes back tears.
Pallavi’s shocked parents look on helplessly as Sanap says his wife suffered a breakdown and is under treatment.
Hiragir Gosavi, father of Durgesh, blames the forest department for Pallavi's death. “First, it was my child and now, the little girl. I had told the officials to lay a trap after my son was snatched, but they didn’t take the suggestion seriously enough. They just put up a cage, which served no purpose. It took the loss of another life to make the administration realise the gravity of the situation."
On the evening of April 3, Durgesh was crawling on the veranda of the Gosavis’ house in a sugarcane field. “I was holding him, but he wanted to move forward. I let go of him. Right then, a leopard appeared out of nowhere and snatched him. It all happened too soon. By the time I realised what had happened and began shouting, it was too late,” recollects Durgesh's grandmother. The distraught family has since abandoned its home and is staying at a rented house in the village. Leopards had an upper hand in both the cases because the areas were cloaked in darkness. Because they lunged for the throat first, the toddlers couldn't even cry out. The children's bodies were recovered from the sugarcane fields.
Pallavi's death was the last straw. Villagers decided they had had enough. They held a road roko the night Pallavi was snatched. The delay in catching the leopard has only made them angrier since then. "The forest officials set up six cages to trap the leopard, but they've all been ineffective," says Madukar Kale of the village.
Pallavi's death was the last straw. Villagers decided they had had enough. They held a road roko the night Pallavi was snatched. The delay in catching the leopard has only made them angrier since then. "The forest officials set up six cages to trap the leopard, but they've all been ineffective," says Madukar Kale of the village.
Residents claim that there are four leopards — two males and two females — on the loose in the village. They are sure that they had been trapped in the past and set free into the wild. “They will never set foot inside a cage again,” reasons a villager.
Many claim to have seen a leopard moving around and climbing over one of the cages, but not going into one. Reports of roars and sightings on a tree are flying thick and fast. Anything sparkling in the dark is presumed to be a leopard’s eyes. The animals have also hit the villagers’ means of livelihood. It is past time to water the sugarcane fields, but workers refuse to enter them.
The forest department fears that the sense of panic among the villagers and the subsequent efforts taken by them may be keeping the leopards away. “We have a team deployed at the village and the fields. They are manning the cages. But, the panicking villagers get so noisy that no leopard will approach the traps,” says A L Pawar, Yeola range forest officer.
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