Indore News: Wild Boar Trap Snared Leopard; Poacher's Backyard Yields Paws

Indore (Madhya Pradesh): A trivial hunt for wild boar escalated into a devastating wildlife crime, adding another casualty to India’s grim ledger of accidental leopard killings.

The man responsible, Garhi village resident Dinesh Mewara, 35, now faces charges after investigators recovered the leopard’s severed paws from his property. Police detained Mewara after he confessed to chopping the limbs for financial profit, instantly closing the case that began with the discovery of the mutilated carcass in the Double Chowki forest range.

The death signals a systemic issue: a joint review of enforcement data by wildlife monitoring organisations, including TRAFFIC, documented 446 incidents of wild animals caught in snares between 2018 and 2022, with leopards and sloth bears frequently being the incidental victims.

Accidental trap, calculated mutilation

The incident began on a Saturday evening when local villagers found the carcass near a roadside drain 30 kilometres from Indore.

A post-mortem confirmed a clutch-wire snare killed the animal, and revealed clear signs of illegal hunting: the front paws were severed and missing, and the upper two canine teeth had been cut.

Forest team led by DFO Pradeep Mishra, SDO Yohan Katara and ranger Sangeeta Thakur soon had a major breakthrough when a herder reported a rumour of a video.

The video showing leopard alive and trapped in the snare was found through Mewara’s son leading to him eventually.

Confronted with the video evidence and subject to focused psychological questioning for days, Mewara confessed to the crime. Investigators recovered the severed paws from his backyard, along with an airgun and other small weapons.

Mewara confessed to setting traps for wild boars, an illegal act, but claimed the leopard was caught accidentally. Well aware of animal movements, he regularly set five to six traps. When the leopard died, he was unable to remove the nails cleanly, so he chopped off the paws. His primary motivation was financial gain; he planned to sell the nails and paws.

Wider threat: Snares as silent killers

Mishra expressed concern that such incidents increase during the winter season. “The Mewara case highlights a systemic risk, as snares intended for common species frequently kill protected predators,” Mishra said.

Available data substantiates this danger:

Between 2010 and 2018, the Wildlife Protection Society of India recorded 109 leopards and 22 tigers choked to death across the country due to wire snares.

Furthermore, a review documented 446 incidents of wild animals caught in snares between 2018 and 2022, with leopards and sloth bears frequently being the incidental victims of traps primarily targeting wild boars.

Protective measures: increased surveillance & solution

Mishra proposed a series of solutions to protect the wildlife population.

Intensified Patrols: All forest officials will conduct extensive surveillance in their assigned beat or area once a week.

Strict Enforcement: Strict action will be taken in villages prone to such incidents.

Targeted Surveillance: Improved surveillance of areas with electrical wires is needed, as regions frequently encounter problems with electrical wire traps.

Data Utilisation: Use of analysis of trip data from electrical stations as a critical component of tracking such incidents, which Mishra employed following a tiger death in 2017 in Shahdol.