Video By: Rafiqa Bano | Article By: Nusrat Ali
As human populations expand and natural habitats shrink, people and animals are increasingly coming into conflict over living space and food.
The man-animal conflict has been increasing over the period of 30 years in Kashmir due to the shrinking of buffer spaces between forests and human habitation. Over the past few years, there has been increase in such incidents in Jammu and Kashmir. In the last three years, official figures reveal that around 60 people were killed and around 600 injured in man-animal conflict.
People lose their crops, livestock, property, and sometimes their lives. The animals, many of which are already threatened or endangered, are often killed in retaliation or to ‘prevent’ future conflicts.
Our CC from Budgam travels 40 km from Budgam town into village Drang, a few Kilometers from Toasamaidan a tourist resort, and meets the family of an 8-year-old child who was killed by a leopard in March 2018.
Parvaiz Ahmad, the Youngest child of Mohammad Shafi was playing in the lawn of his house when a leopard attacked him from behind. The wild animal left Parvaiz in a pool of blood when the villager residents attacked leopard, who later escaped into forest. The injured was rushed to local hospital, where he was declared bought dead.
Mass urbanization, denudation of forests, encroachment of forestland, vanishing of buffer zones in the forests are some of the reasons responsible for increasing conflicts between humans and animals.
