Partially devoured body of missing woman found in Ooty, tiger or leopard attack suspected

Ooty: The tourist city of Nilgiris was shocked when a search team recovered the partially eaten body of a missing woman on Thursday morning. The deceased is Anjalai (50), a daily wage labourer and wife of Gopal, a native of Bomman Nagar. According to a communiqué from the forest department, Anjalai had been missing since Wednesday.

Some workers who spotted the body in a tea estate alerted Anjalai's family. Some parts of the body were partially eaten by an animal.

Tiger or leopard, yet to be confirmed
The forest officials are yet to confirm whether a tiger or leopard attacked the woman.

A farm labourer, Anjali, had gone to pluck tea leaves in an estate at Kalibata near Minala, Arakkad. Despite a night-long search, her husband and neighbours failed to trace her.

Surveillance cameras installed
After being notified by the police, a team of forest department personnel rushed to the spot and confirmed that the body belonged to Anjalai, the missing woman. Marks in the area suggested that the animal dragged the woman for about 20 meters to a bushy spot near the tea plantation.

After inquest procedures, the police shifted the woman’s body to the Government Hospital here for a post-mortem. The officials stated that the mortal remains would be handed over to the relatives on Friday.

An official from the Forest Department said that an inquiry is underway to confirm whether it was a leopard or tiger that killed and devoured the unfortunate woman.

“Both live cameras and regular cameras have been installed to track the movement of the animal,” said the official, who preferred to remain anonymous.

High alert sounded in plantation region
The forest department has already asked plantation owners and workers to exercise extreme caution due to wild animal attacks in the region.

Until the animal is identified and captured, the department has advised people to avoid farming activities for a few days to prevent any further incidents, as the animal may have become a man-eater by now.

Meanwhile, fear gripped the entire region when news of the woman’s death spread like wildfire. Many such incidents have been reported in the district in recent years, though this is the first such case in the Ooty suburbs. In Pandalur, a male leopard had killed a three-year-old girl and a 29-year-old tribal woman. More than nine lives were lost in the Gudalur and Pandalur taluks of the Nilgiris district due to recurring elephant attacks over the past year.