Bengaluru, May 27: A 60-year-old man has become the talk of the town after he saved a septuagenarian from a leopard and trapped it inside his house at Bellikothanur village near Kanakapura town in Ramanagara district on Friday night.
75-year-old Dodda Thimmaiah was asleep around midnight when the leopard sneaked into the raw silk godown. When Thimmaiah panicked on seeing the feline, it pounced on him.
Jagadish, a silk farmer who owns the godown, immediately intervened and pulled Thimmaiah out. He held back the leopard with a stick, and managed to trap it inside the house.
He then rushed the injured Thimmaiah to a hospital. He had gashes on his torso and bite marks near his ears. The police said he was recovering.
It is learnt that Jagadish had employed Thammaiah to assist him. On Friday night, Thammaiah, who sleeps inside, had forgotten to latch the shed from inside and went to sleep. In the meantime, a leopard, which had strayed away from a nearby forest, sneaked inside the shed and tried to attack Thammaiah.
“Thammaiah started screaming loudly out of pain. I ran towards the shed with a torch and a stick thinking that a bear or a snake must have entered the shed. I picked up Thammaiah and rushed out of the shed. While a bleeding Thammaiah was too shocked to respond, I didn’t have the time to go and seek help as I didn’t know what would come out of the door,” recounted Jagadish.
Mustering courage, Jagadish went inside the shed to ascertain what was in the shed. “I just froze in fear when I saw a leopard staring at me. I began to shiver, but it was a question of life and death for me. I knew the animal could bring me down with a single strike, but I chose not to give up. After staring at me for a few seconds the leopard roared and tried to advance towards me, but I poked it with my stick and pushed it back. Before the leopard could come to terms with what had happened, I ran out of the shed and locked it from outside.”
Subsequently, fellow villagers were alerted and forest department personnel were informed. As news of the locked leopard spread, a large crowd of villagers gathered at the spot making it difficult for the police to disperse the crowd. A bystander Kiran, who was standing close to the window and peeked inside to get a better view of the feline, was also injured when the leopard attacked him.
On Saturday morning, forest officials and veterinarians from Bannerghatta National Park tranquillised the big cat by shooting a dart through the window. It was taken for observation to Channapatna from where it may be released into the forest nearby.
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