New Delhi: Officials from Delhi’s forest and wildlife department say they are closely monitoring the leopard spotted in Jagatpur village near East Delhi. They are working to determine whether the animal is a resident or merely passing through the area, after which they will decide whether to rehabilitate it.
“We got reports of the leopard being spotted near the fields Tuesday, after which we deployed a team to go and surveil the area,” a forest official familiar with the matter told ThePrint. “We are talking to the locals to figure out whether the leopard has frequented the place before, and where it originates from.”
Late Sunday night, a camera trap placed by wildlife photographer Hemant Garg caught a leopard roaming around the Jagatpur village, near the Yamuna Biodiversity Park. Earlier, villagers had told Garg that they had heard growls at night, and he decided to look into it.
“This area has seen leopard sightings before, earlier in March and even in 2024. So maybe there is an ecological corridor nearby, maybe the animals travel upstream from the Yamuna,” said Garg, who has been photographing wildlife in Delhi for over 2 years. “I’m not sure, but I wanted to see for myself whether there actually was a leopard or not so I helped the local villagers install the camera.”
After the trap caught visuals of the leopard at 10.27 pm Sunday night, the forest department was informed. A team of 8 officials visited the site Tuesday afternoon.
“There’s very dense foliage in the region, and some fields of the farmers living nearby. It is easy for the leopard to stay hidden for a while,” said Garg.
Since Sunday, the leopard has not been spotted or caught on camera. Garg said, “This is a particularly shy leopard and the only way we could capture it was in an overnight camera trap.”
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Rehabilitation and rescue
The Delhi forest department has a dedicated wildlife rescue and rehabilitation programme. Last year, too, the team had rescued a leopard from the Jagatpur village, where it had gotten into someone’s house.
“Last year, the leopard had injured some residents and was trapped inside a house. So we had to rehabilitate it, there was no option,” said a forest official. “We released it into the Asola Bhatti Wildlife Sanctuary then.”
But now, since the leopard is still outside and hasn’t entered human habitation yet, the team wants to wait before they rehabilitate it. Since the leopard could be just passing through, and not be native to any of the forests in Delhi, rewilding it in the Ridge or the Asola Bhatti Sanctuary would not be a good idea before the department knows more about the animal.
“We want to keep both the safety of the leopard and the humans in mind—we don’t want either to be harmed,” said the forest official. “Our monitoring team is situated at the spot 24×7, so that the people are reassured too.”
(Edited by Sanya Mathur)
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