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New Delhi: In yet another cheetah death in Madhya Pradesh, a 26-month-old cub of adult female cheetah, Gamini was killed in a road accident on Sunday morning. The animal was reportedly hit by a speeding vehicle on the National Highway in Gwalior. According to a report in the Times of India, the accident happened early Sunday morning.
The death of the cub born to African cheetah Gamini, is the second death of the animal reported in the past 72 hours. Earlier, another cheetah cub was found dead by forest officials on Thursday. This time the sub-adult cheetah was killed, right in front of national park officials, who had been monitoring its movements.
The cheetah was killed on the Agra-Mumbai National Highway in Gwalior, when a high speed vehicle hit it. It was trying to cross the road when it was reportedly hit by the vehicle. The Rajasthan bound vehicle, coming from Gujarat hit the animal between 5 am to 6 am on Sunday. The cheetah had been fitted with a satellite collar and forest officials had been monitoring it through the night.
The vehicle which hit the cheetah was identified using CCTV footage from multiple points on the National Highway. It was later intercepted near Kota. An enquiry has now been launched to determine what exactly caused the vehicle to hit the animal. The possible reasons which might have caused the incident are poor visibility, overspeeding or driver's negligence.
The cheetah cub which was found dead inside the Kuno National Park, had just been released into the wild by CM Mohan Yadav, a day back. The release happened on World Cheetah Day on Thursday and the animal was found dead on Friday. The postmortem report of the cheetah cub is still awaited, but it is believed that it died after falling from a height.
According to the officer, the sub adult cheetah which died in the road accident had been living near the Highway, with its mother Gamini and other siblings for the past few days. This is a typical characteristic of cheetahs, where after attaining a certain age, they start to explore new territory and move out of their original habitat, in this case, the Kuno National Park. However this roadkill has definitely raised concerns about sub adult cheetahs moving out to explore fresh territory, at least amongst the wildlife officials and experts.
