The people in the area are living in constant fear after the leopards started entering the human settlements regularly and killing their livestock. “Leopards have been killing livestock every night,” informed Lekhraj Oli, a local teacher. “It has been killing goats and calves whether they are tied outside or inside the shed,” he added.
Agriculture and animal husbandry are the major occupation of people in Khaskushma VDC, which lies 70 kilometer east of the district headquarters. According to Oli, leopard has not spared any village in the vicinity of the park. [break]
Oli also informed that over the last two days, leopard has killed goats owned by Toran Gurung, of Khaskushma-2, Gyan Bahadur Oli and Tilak Budha of Ward no 4 of the VDC.
“There are many people who have lost their livestock to the wild animals,” said Oli.
The victims are entitled compensation as per the law. The Buffer Zone Management Committee is learnt to be collecting the details of the loss to provide compensation to the villagers.
Similarly, the people in the Kusum Village of the VDC have also been affected as wild animals, including elephant, boars and leopard, from the park have destroyed their crop fields and killed their livestock.
The government provides a compensation of up to Rs 10,000 for every farm animal killed by wild animals from the park. Similarly, in the case of human causality, the family of the victim is provided Rs 300,000 in compensation. In case of injury, the law entitles the victim up to Rs 50,000 for medical treatment.
Assistant Conservation Officer Birendra Kandel conceded that the youngest national part of the country, established two years ago, is yet to build proper fences and take other measures to prevent wild animals from entering human settlements.
“We have received information about the leopard killing people´s pigs, calves and goats,” said Kandel, “We are going to train the people living in buffer zone to make build sheds and take up alternative farming to save crops from destruction by wild animals,” he added.
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