Five-year-old mauled to death by lioness in Gujarat’s Amreli district

The kid was playing outside his hut in a farm area of Navi Jikadri village in the evening when the lioness attacked and took him away.

A tragic incident occurred in Gujarat’s Amreli district on October 21, 2024, when a five-year-old boy was mauled to death by a lioness.

The child, the son of farm laborers, was playing outside his hut in a plantation area of Navi Jikadri village in Jafrabad taluka when the attack happened.

According to G.L. Vaghela, the range forest officer, the lioness attacked the boy and carried him away. A search was conducted by both locals and forest officials, and the child’s body was later found and taken to a hospital. Efforts are currently underway to capture the lioness responsible for the attack.

Gujarat: Home to the Asiatic Lions

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Gujarat is the last remaining habitat of the Asiatic lion, with their population growing from 284 in 1990 to 674 by 2020, according to the last census.

Nearly half of the lions have moved beyond protected areas, spreading across nine districts and 13 forest administrative divisions.

Their habitat has expanded from 22,000 square kilometers in 2015 to 30,000 square kilometers by 2020. The growing lion population has increased human-animal conflict, as many lions now roam areas outside the Gir Forest National Park.

This incident highlights the challenges of balancing conservation efforts and ensuring human safety in regions where wildlife habitats overlap with human settlements.