Centre clears leopard sterilisation plan in Maharashtra; project to start in Pune district

Pune, Nov 17 (PTI) Amid growing concerns over leopard sightings and attacks on humans, the Union Ministry of Environment, Forest and Climate Change (MoEFCC) has given nod to a Maharashtra government proposal seeking birth control of leopards in the state, officials said on Monday.

According to the forest department officials, approval to carry out sterilisation-based leopard population management programme has been granted on an experimental basis and the project will start in Pune's Junnar forest division.

"A proposal of the sterilisation-based population management programme was submitted to the Centre for 125 leopardesses last year. We have now got the approval to carry out the first-ever sterilisation-based leopard population management programme on an experimental basis on five leopardesses," said a senior forest department official.

A team of Wildlife Institute of India (WII) researchers, who have extensively monitored behaviour, population trends and conflict incidents involving the big cats in the Junnar forest division, had earlier suggested launching a controlled sterilisation initiative to curb the surge in leopard numbers, he stated.

"Following a detailed review of the proposal and comprehensive discussions with WII scientists, the ministry (MoEFCC) granted its approval. Their scientific evaluation was instrumental in finalising the plan for Junnar," the official noted.

Explaining the procedure of sterilisation, he said that immuno-contraception technique will be adopted for managing leopard population growth.

"Leopardesses will be captured and immuno-contraceptive will be injected to make them infertile," the official explained.

In over a month, three people have lost their lives in leopard attacks in Pune district's Shirur tehsil, which comes under the Junnar forest division. The spate of leopard attacks has sparked anger among people who recently torched a vehicle belonging to the forest department.

A "man-eater" leopard was killed by sharpshooters in Shirur tehsil in the first week of November. PTI SPK RSY