Strange but true. With Goa turning into a concrete jungle, needless to say wild animals could as well be the "pedestrians" of the future. An indication of things to come was this incident that alarmed the inhabitants of the high profile locale of Miramar Panaji Goa within the precincts of Corporation of City of Panaji.
This early morning while students and office goers were on their daily chores a leopard straying around Miramar finally "landed into " a residential apartment "HOME STEAD" of the Menons at Miramar. According to a top official of the office of Conservator of Forests who this writer had a teletalk with +91 0832 2223508, the leopard could have as well come from the nearby Aguada side and swam across the waters and made its way after meandering thro the Miramar area at early morning. According to him there are areas in Bardez which are witness to such leopards prowling, To a question --whether this could be a domesticated one apparently set lose by the owners ---fearing the change of guard expected in the office today with the arrival of the new incumbent Chief Conservator of Forest Mr Richard D Souza IFS who is likely to take charge,( following his transfer to Goa from Arunacahal Pradesh ), he stated that though it is illegal to domesticate such animals classified under Schedule I of the Wild Life Act 1972 atleast this one did not appear to look like one domesticated and had to be tranquilised before being nabbed and sent to the Bondla zoo. It may be recalled that during the earlier term of Mr Richard D Souza IFS in Goa as Conservator of Forests during the BJP led coalition regime, the first thing that he did was to raid all places where such prohibited animals under Wild Life Act were domesticated by people of Goa. All such animals were confiscated from these unauthorise owners and taken to the Bondla zoo. This earned the wrath of many animal lovers, though Mr D Souza was shunted out of the State after a brief innings for other reasons. It is believed that the mining lobby then feared his functioning strictly by the rule book and so that he was booted out. Efforts to contact the inmate of the house Ms Angelica Menon on +91 0832 2461143 in whose house the wild animal was found early morning by the howling of her dog were futile. Meanwhile when this writer spoke to an animal lover in South Goa who had suffered a similar fate at the hands of Mr D Souza, he agreed that this may not have been a domesticated one by the owners of the house, where it was found, but did not rule out the possibility of the leopards being domesticated by others and subsequently released out of fear of being raided-- He agreed that though one would need to excercise great caution to keep leopards as it eas necessary to keep them away from other feline genre. There was yet another animal lover who agreed that there might be a coincidence with the leopard being found and the arrival of Mr Richard D Souza in Goa. He is sure that there will be a notice issued by him directing all animal lovers in the State to surrender the all animals prohibited from being domesticated as included in the Schedule I of WLA. At the same time he wondered how the Government could fill the zoo at Bondla with domesticated animals from private owners. Does the law distinguish from Government as the owner and private individuals in matters of domestication? How then can they put such animals in its zoo? Ironically some four years ago there was a board at Bondla indicating that most of the animals held at Bondla were confiscated from private owners. GODFREY J I GONSALVES BORDA MARGAO GOA 9822158584 [EMAIL PROTECTED] __________________________________________________________ Yahoo! India Matrimony: Find your partner now. Go to http://yahoo.shaadi.com _____________________________________________ Do not post admin requests to the list. Goanet mailing list (Goanet@goanet.org) Help/Unsubscribe/Update your Subscription: %(user_optionsurl)s This email sent to %(user_address)s