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Clashes between wildlife and humans continue in India (2019 photo)
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A leopard has attacked people in eastern India, injuring at least 15 people.
At the time of the attacks, the animal had been foraging in the city of Jorhat in the state of Assam since the beginning of the week, a forest official told the Times of India.
There is a forest nearby.
A hospital spokesman told local media that the injured were taken to a hospital with bite wounds.
According to the Times of India, the leopard probably first looked for food on the campus of a rainforest research institute.
That's where most of the injured were, including two forest workers.
The animal is also said to have roamed the surrounding villages, as forest workers reported to the Times of India.
A hospital worker told the newspaper that a woman and two children were among the injured, but all the injured who have arrived so far are out of danger.
Animal caught - broken legs probably by humans
A video shared by Indian news agency ANI shows the predator leaping over a fence and then onto a car before turning away.
The animal was finally captured on Tuesday, as the head of the Wildlife Trust of India, Rathin Barman, told the New Indian Express.
Several fractures were then discovered in one of the animal's legs.
These would be treated accordingly and were probably caused by people attacking the animal.
Barman suspected that the animal was also behaving aggressively because of this.
In India, there are always conflicts between humans and wild animals such as leopards and tigers living freely in forests.
With the deforestation of forests, human settlements sometimes move very close to the habitat of the predators.
This can result in these people or their livestock killing – and people then killing the animals, partly out of revenge.
kko/dpa
