Nagpur: In a painful incident, a full-grown leopard was knocked dead by an unidentified vehicle near Yensa village on Nagpur-Chandrapur Highway. The mishap occurred around 12 in the midnight on Wednesday. The big cat must have been crossing the road when the speeding vehicle hit it.
On being informed, Forest Department officials reached the spot and started investigations.
Notably, Maharashtra has recorded the highest number of leopard deaths in accidents among all states with 22 cases — 19 in road, three in train accidents — in 2019. Eighty-three leopard deaths in train and road accidents were recorded in 2019 in the state which is the highest in a decade. While 73 leopards were killed in road accidents, 10 were run over by trains.
In 2019, following 22 leopard deaths in Maharashtra, were Uttarakhand (11 deaths), Rajasthan (10 deaths), Madhya Pradesh (nine deaths), Karnataka (seven deaths), and Gujarat (five deaths).
