Indore: A man jumped into the lions’ enclosure in Kamla Nehru Municipal Corporation Zoo here and roamed about for a bit before being rescued on Thursday.
The incident happened around 1pm, when the man, identified as Kailash Verma, climbed on steel pipes near the lions’ enclosure. He then scaled the wired fencing and jumped 18 feet inside the den.
People nearby mistook him to be a zoo staffer and did not raise an alarm, while zoo authorities failed to spot him.
Verma, said to be mentally unstable, then proceeded to roam around the enclosure. Luckily for him, the lions were sitting on other side of the enclosure and did not spot him.
At one point, the man climbed on a shed within the enclosure and started eating roasted chana he was carrying with him in a plastic bag.
Finally, one of the zoo-keepers spotted him and immediately alerted his colleagues.
“The zoo keepers sensing the man in danger and collectively made loud noise to distract lions. This normally done by staffers whenever they call lions for giving them food or sending them back to cages in any emergency,” said zoo-in-charge Uttam Yadav.
When the lions retreated to their cages, one of the zoo keepers went inside the den and brought the Verma out, he said adding that he was mentally sound and seemed under the influence of some narcotic as he was not able to talk properly.
Verma, a resident of Sajan Nagar, was not mentally sound and was handed over to his family, police said. Last year, a similar incident occurred it the tiger enclosure of the zoo.
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