We did hunt for positive news that the govt likes so much and caught this cuddly story

Arnab Ganguly, TT,  Aug 15, 2018 , Mumbai: If Bagheera of The Jungle Book is looking for a worthy successor, he may have found a little one at Tuesday dawn, dozing off under a mosquito net by the side of two boys aged no more than three months and three years in Nashik.

Like the mentor of Mowgli, this leopard with the spotted coat (not a black panther like Bagheera) appeared to have had no problem co-existing - or co-snoozing - with the little humans.

The leopard cub crawled under the mosquito net and found space for himself with the two tiny tots at their home when their mother, Manisha Barde, had gone to the field before daybreak. The father of the children was also apparently in bed.

"The mother had left the door ajar when she went out around 5am, possibly to start the water pump to irrigate the field. When she returned, she thought a cat was in the bed, made on a mattress on the floor of the house. When she realised it was a leopard cub, she showed great courage and took out her children one after the other before alerting villagers," said Ramesh Dhondse, the range forest officer of Igatpuri, 45km from Nashik in Maharashtra.

The gender of the cub and the boys matches. So does the absolute age of the leopard and the younger baby - three months.

The human age of the cub would be around 15 months. Perhaps, a bit young for a sleepover with friends but kids have a way of getting along.

To the credit of the villagers of Dhamangaon in Igatpuri, they did not behave like Buldeo, the hunter in The Jungle Book. The villagers waited patiently for forest officials to arrive, leaving the cub to sleep in peace for 45 minutes.

Neither the children nor the adults were in any mortal danger from the cub. "Had the cub's mother been around, rescue would not have been easy," said a forest officer.

The leopard cub snarled as forest officials took it to Igatpuri from where it would be released back into the nearby forest. Deforestation, habitat encroachment and poaching force leopards to enter human habitats.