Leopard at Infosys Mysuru campus still elusive, staff working from home

A large team of leopard task force continued with combing operations at the sprawling Infosys campus in Mysuru on Tuesday after security personnel sighted a leopard around 3 am.

The software exporter asked its employees to work from home for the day, and not to step out of their hostel premises.

Forest Minister Eshwar Khandre said his department has deployed drones fitted with advanced cameras to locate the movement of the big cat, while requesting the stakeholders to stay calm.


The cameras, forest officials said, could locate the animal even during night hours. The forest personnel are trying to restrict its movement to prevent its entry into the residential layouts close by.

The Infosys security personnel sighted the animal in the early morning and the CCTV footage too confirmed its presence. They spotted the animal in the underground car parking area. The 40-member task force swiftly responded to the emergency calls and began combing operations in the morning as the 360-acre campus is also home to thousands of technology workers. The forest personnel have placed cages at strategic locations.

The team consists of experts trained at capturing the wild animal and veterinarians armed with tranquilizer shots. The leopard had not been sighted till late evening, despite intense search. Infosys, however, did not respond to an email seeking comments.

The forest personnel scanned the CCTV images but could not make much progress for most of the day as the campus has patches of thick vegetation and is surrounded by forests. The nearby BEML campus too is a very large one with vast areas of shrub forests, an ideal habitat for leopards.

There was no official word yet about the company’s plans on extending the work-from-home on Wednesday, too.

Forest staff were convinced about the leopard’s presence as they noticed pugmarks. This is not the first time the Infosys campus in Mysuru has a visitor from the wild. In 2011 too, a leopard had strayed into the campus which was, however, tranquilized and captured successfully.

A five-year old leopard had created a similar scare in Electronic City area in Bengaluru in the third week of September after it entered the sprawling technology hub from the nearby Bannerghatta forests. It evaded capture by the forest personnel for a few days before giving up and landing into their net.