Leopard shot dead in Hyderabad

HYDERABAD,

November 8. A full-grown leopard, which has been striking terror among the residents of Mettuguda since early this morning, was finally shot dead by noon, but not before it had mauled five persons.

The animal, five feet long and looking well-fed, was first sighted at about 5.20 am as it was sneaking out of the house of one Mr. Mustaq Hussain. Since then it had been prowling in the areas, taking refuge in the bushes in the compound of the railway quarters there.

In the process, it attacked whomever it came across, the victims including a student of the Indian Railways

School of Telecommunications, two passers by, one shikari and a police constable.

Finally, it fell to a series of bullets fired by a Police SubInspector, a youngster of 22 years, and the shikari. Then it was 11.45 am and the police and the local inhabitants had scanned the area for hours before sighting the animal on the run. It was in the compound of a high railway official, Mr. A. Lakshmi Narayanan, that the animal was shot dead.