Pune: The surge in leopard attacks in Junnar division has prompted the forest department to introduce spiked neck belts for farm workers as a preventive measure. "In the last five years, most attacks involved the leopard grabbing a person's neck, sinking its teeth deep, and killing them. We considered the attack pattern and came up with a feasible way to mitigate it," Amol Satpute, deputy conservator of forests (Junnar), said.
The neck belt was developed by a city-based company and was later approved by the forest department for manufacture. The company took around a month to develop the model using 3D printing. Developed at the Centre of Excellence at Vidya Pratishthan in Baramati by Sunil Chore, chairman and managing director of Simusoft Technologies, and his team, the belt is made of plastic with 40mm-long spikes.
Once the 3D prototype was completed, the belt was tested by a few villagers and forest department officials for comfort and mobility. It was also presented to the district collector for approval. "The C-shaped belt, which will be 5mm thick, will cover the person's neck when they are working in the field or need to go to the farm at night.
The length of the spike was decided after studying the depth of a leopard's teeth. We then contacted a plastic company that would create a mould and prototype. Each belt should cost about Rs 50," Chore said.
Satpute admitted that it may take some time to make these belts socially acceptable among villagers. "But it is a matter o.