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- Hundreds of Indian police have been deployed to search for a pack of wolves who are reported to have killed nine people, eight of them children
LUCKNOW: Hundreds of Indian police have been deployed to search for a pack of wolves who are reported to have killed nine people, eight of them children, wildlife officials said Monday.
In the northern state of Uttar Pradesh, terrified residents of Bahraich district are keeping all-night vigils, deploying guard dogs and letting off firecrackers in hopes of scaring off the predators.
The killings have happened over the past two months, with the latest attack on a six-year-old boy in the early hours of Sunday morning. The boy was sleeping on the veranda of his home — a common practice during the hot and humid days of the monsoon rains — when the wolf grabbed him by the neck.
“I woke up to find my son in the animal’s jaws,” his mother Gudiya told the Times of India.
“I acted instinctively and pulled my son away with as much strength as I could muster.”
Experts say wolves attack humans or livestock only as a last resort when they are starving — preferring less dangerous prey such as small antelopes.
But wildlife officials say heavy flooding from extreme torrential rains has swamped the wolves’ usual territory and driven them into areas of more populated farmland.
“When their natural prey is no longer available, wolves are left with fewer options,” said state forestry official Ajeet Kumar Singh, who is part of the wolf hunt, told the Times of India.
“The floods have created a scarcity that has pushed them to take risks they wouldn’t normally consider.”
The grassland plains of Bahraich district lie about 50 kilometres south of the border with Nepal, where thick forests cover Himalayan foothills.