Belloor residents protest at Kasaragod Forest office over leopard's release near their village

Kasaragod: Hours after the Forest Department released a leopard, caught from Bedadka grama panchayat, into the wild, the residents of Belloor grama panchayat led by its president Sreedhara M, are staging a sit-in protest in front of the District Forest Office.

Though the Forest Department was tight-lipped on where the five-year-old leopard was dropped off, the residents of Belloor said they found the animal was released into the Bantaje reserve forest bordering their village.

"Until now, we only had intrusions by wild buffaloes, boars, and monkeys. Now, the Forest Department has gifted us a leopard," said Sreedhara.

He said officials refused to disclose the release location, but CCTV footage from Nettanige — the panchayat’s entry point in the fifth ward — showed the department's vehicle carrying the leopard entering at 3.31 am on Monday. "Several CCTV cameras caught the vehicle going towards Bantaje reserve forest," Sreedhara of the BJP said.

The Bantaje Reserve Forest primarily falls under Karnataka's Dakshina Kannada district, within the Puttur range. A 2004 study by the Centre for Development Studies (CDS) estimated that 860 acres of Bantaje forest lie within Kerala.

However, Sreedhara said that while the forest stretched in length, its width was only about 500 metres on Kerala's side. It stretches from wards 1 to 4 of Indumoola, Baja, Koladapara, and Maradamoola in Belloor panchayat and also borders Delampady panchayat in Kasaragod.

"Most of the residents are from the Scheduled Tribe and Scheduled Caste communities. The Forest Department has put their lives in danger by releasing the leopard close to their homes," he said.

Sreedhara alleged that District Forest Officer K Ashraf was rude when he raised the issue over the phone. "That's why (the panchayat's) Development Standing Committee chairman Chandrashekara Rai and I came to his office. But he left for home before we arrived. We will sit here until the DFO returns and addresses our concerns," he said.

On hearing about the panchayat president's impromptu protest at 5.30 pm, several residents from Belloor set out for Kasaragod to join. "The leopard had injuries near its eye. Yet, the Forest department released it in Karnataka Forest. What a shame," said Rajagopala Kaipangala, a resident of Belloor panchayat, joining their president's protest.

Forest officials, however, are livid with the panchayat president. "Should we seek the panchayat’s permission before releasing a wild animal into the forest?" said Kasaragod Forest Range Officer C V Vinod Kumar. He said the department and the Rapid Response Team had been trying to catch the leopard for seven months. "Once we caught it, we released it in a far-off location," he said.

The officer dismissed the Belloor panchayat president’s concerns as fear-mongering. "I told him that Muliyar and Karadka panchayats also have forestland, yet there have been no reports of leopard attacks on humans," he said.

That said, several dogs have been killed by leopards in the past three months in the Kasaragod district, including Muliyar.

The Forest Range Officer assured the panchayat president that camera traps would be set up to monitor the leopard if it ventured into human habitation. "But he refuses to listen. It’s been over 12 hours since the leopard was released, and there hasn’t been a single sighting," he said.

Kasaragod MLA N A Nellikunnu arrived at the District Forest Office to broker peace. He, too, told the protesters that the Forest officials would install cameras tonight and would reconvene a meeting at 10 am on Tuesday. The panchayat president and residents, however, remain firm. "There’s no point in protesting after something unfortunate happens," Sreedhara said.