Another Leopard attack: TTD mulls closing Alipiri-Tirumala walking paths after 3 pm

Tirumala: After it was confirmed that a leopard killed the six-year-old girl, who was found dead on Saturday early morning, on the Alipiri-Tirumala pedestrian route, the TTD is considering the possibility of allowing the devotees to use both trekking paths only till 2 to 3 pm every day.

The TTD has also asked the forest officials for a plan to construct fences on both sides of the pedestrian route. The SV University forensic department officials conducted a post-mortem on the girl’s body on Saturday and returned it to her family.

TTD Trust Board Chairman Bhumana Karunakara Reddy announced an ex-gratia of Rs. 10 lakhs --Rs 5 lakhs by TTD and Rs 5 lakhs by Forest department to the bereaved family.

TTD EO AV Dharma Reddy, on Saturday, held a high-level meeting with the Tirumala Tirupati Devasthanams forest, vigilance and security, police and forest department officials at Gokulam Conference Hall. After the girl’s death, the TTD beefed up its security, along with officials from forest and police departments at all the vulnerable points along the footpath route.

One security guard for 100 people

Addressing the media, EO said that the TTD is committed to taking stringent measures on the footpaths to stop such wild beast attacks in the future. “Nearly 500 CC cameras are planned from the point of Gali Gopuram to Lakshmi Narasimha Swami temple,” said the EO.

The TTD has already announced the same security measures along the footpath routes, in the backdrop of the incident of June 22 where a three-year-old boy Kaushik from the Kurnool district was dragged by a leopard near the 7th mile along the Alipiri-Tirumala pedestrian route but miraculously saved by the TTD personnel in time.

Henceforth, a group of 100 people will be allowed along with a security guard at this vulnerable point. “We have already deployed 30 TTD security and 10 forest guards at this point and we will enhance the number of personnel now,” he said.

Girl was not walking with family

According to the police, Lakshita’s family is from Pothireddy Palem, Kovvuru Mandal in Nellore district. They came by car to Tirumala and started walking the steps on Friday afternoon. The girl along with her family was climbing the footway to Tirumala when the incident occurred. At around 6:30 pm on Friday, the girl, who was ahead of her parents, Dinesh, Sasikala, and other family members, went missing.

Assuming that she was kidnapped or might have missed her route, her parents immediately complained, and the TTD police, security personnel and forest staff launched a search operation. On Saturday, at around 4 am, the girl was found dead near Narasimha Swamy temple with severe leopard attack injuries.

“The CC camera footage showed that Lakshita was alone, quite away from her parents. I appeal to the parents who are walking with children on footpaths to take additional precautions,” said the EO.

According to TTD’s chief vigilance officials, the girl had asked her father to buy something but he refused, following which she moved ahead and went missing.

Two cages to trap the beast

The chief conservator of forest Nageswara Rao said that the forest department, along with trained personnel, has already kept two cages ready on a 24x7 basis. He said the tranquillizers are also kept ready to catch the predator soon.

The TTD said they will initiate measures as soon as the forest officials furnish the report.