Fact Check: No, the leopard in the viral video is not drunk

Hyderabad: A video of an exhausted leopard along with a crowd is viral on social media. The video has been shared by several users claiming that the leopard has drunk desi liquor in a village in Madhya Pradesh.

The crowd can be seen playing with a leopard taking selfies and touching the poor leopard with stick and trying to take a ride on him as the leopard seems cool and calm.

Fact Check

NewsMeter found the claim to be false.

On performing a Reverse Image Search on the viral image, we found the same video on TV9 Telugu’s YouTube channel TV9 titled, ‘Madhya Pradesh: Sick Leopard wanders into Village’. According to the report, ‘The leopard was seen roaming in the forest near Iklera in Madhya Pradesh's Dewas district. Some villagers got scared at first, but when they saw that the leopard was lethargic and not aggressive, they understood that it was sick. The villagers gathered around the leopard and started playing with it.’

According to a report by Times of India dated 31^st August 2023, ‘A wild leopard — considerably weakened by illness- was on Tuesday turned into an object of ridicule by some villagers in Dewas, MP. Who treated it like a pet dog and you and tried to ride it. The shocking abuse of the male leopard aged around 10 was caught on cameras and the footage went viral on Wednesday. The forest department rescued the animal near Kalisindh river’.

We also found the same report on the NDTV website.

Over a keyword search, we also found the same information on the official X handle of PTI, "A rescue operation is being carried out by the forest officials after a leopard was found in an exhausted state by the local people in Iklera village of Madhya Pradesh."

NewsMeter investigation revealed that the leopard was not drunk but ill and exhausted.