Leopards are generalist species that range over a wide variety of habitat types. In India, protected areas, reserved forests, sugarcane and areca nut plantations in certain areas, tea and coffee production landscapes and village outskirts in some regions have resident leopard populations. Leopards are also found in forests and agricultural habitats in the edges of urban sprawls such as Bengaluru, Mumbai, Jaipur and other peri-urban localities across the country. Leopard populations in protected areas and reserved forests have minimal interface with people apart from communities living inside. Human-leopard conflict is primarily along the interface areas between forests and human use areas and inside human use areas where leopards have become resident. The presence of leopards in a human-dominated landscape will inevitably lead to some level of livestock loss and occasionally attacks on humans can happen. When leopards persist in entirely human-use areas such as sugarcane and maize fields, tea/coffee/areca nut plantations or village outskirts, the frequency of interactions are much higher.

Positive interactions, though very few, are exemplified by the situation in Jawai area of Pali district in Rajasthan when local communities share a positive relationship with leopards which in turn has helped generate vast revenues in leopard-based tourism in the region. In another example from Bengaluru and Mumbai, schools and gated communities have accepted leopard presence within their vicinity due to outreach activities undertaken by civil. Negative interactions assume the most severe proportions when people are injured or killed by leopards. The proportion of human-leopard interactions which are negative in nature and result in livestock loss, leopard deaths, leopard injury, human injury and human deaths.

The purpose of these guidelines is to facilitate a common understanding and consensus among key stakeholders in India, on key approaches and possible solutions for mitigating human leopard conflict in India.

Download a copy of the guidelines here