An 11-year-old boy from Gujarat’s Kheda district died after a lion attacked him near the 50th step of the Girnar staircase during a pre-dawn pilgrimage trek on Saturday, an official said, adding that the forest department has closed the route until further orders and captured three lions.
The child was attacked near the 50th step of the Girnar staircase during a pre-dawn trek; the forest department closed the route and captured three lions.
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According to Akshay Joshi, deputy conservator of forests (DCF), Girnar wildlife division, the victim was identified as Mayur Chauhan. He had travelled to Girnar with his family on a pilgrimage and begun climbing the hill in the early hours and was attacked near the 50th step. Forest department personnel, trackers and veterinarians launched a search operation and later recovered child’s remains from the forest.
Raj Vagdoda, a pilgrim from Palanpur, said he and his brother had started climbing at around 3.45 am and had reached about the 50th or 55th step when they heard people shouting behind them.
“We went back around 10 steps and saw some people flashing torches at the lion, teasing it and shouting. The lion appeared to get agitated. This could have led the lion to attack the child later,” Vagdoda told reporters.
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Joshi said officials first captured a lion suspected to have carried out the attack. During the veterinary examination, the lion regurgitated the human body parts, confirming its involvement. Two other suspected lions were later captured and all three will be shifted to the Sakkarbaug Zoo in Junagadh for further examination, he added.
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Joshi said officials first captured a lion suspected to have carried out the attack. During the veterinary examination, the lion regurgitated the human body parts, confirming its involvement. Two other suspected lions were later captured and all three will be shifted to the Sakkarbaug Zoo in Junagadh for further examination, he added.
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The Girnar hill, which houses several Hindu and Jain temples, is one of Gujarat’s most important pilgrimage centres and attracts thousands of devotees every day. Some pilgrims said sections of the staircase were poorly lit as some lights along the route were not functioning following recent rains.
He is an Ahmedabad-based journalist with more than two decades of experience. His career spans business journalism and general news, with reporting across politics, crime, governance, public policy, business, industry, infrastructure, energy, ports, aviation, the environment, wildlife and social issues. He began his career in feature writing before moving into business journalism, reporting on companies and sectors including energy, infrastructure, pharmaceuticals, automobiles and real estate. Over the years, his work expanded to politics, courts, crime, public policy, civic affairs, the environment and wildlife. His reporting has taken him from government offices and courtrooms to factory floors, ports, forests and remote villages, covering stories that range from industrial investments and financial markets to elections, conservation and issues affecting everyday life. While many assignments demand the pace of the daily news cycle, others require sustained reporting over months and years to follow developments beyond the headlines. He started his journalism career with the Asian Age in Ahmedabad in 2002 as a feature writer and sub-editor. Since 2022, he has been working with Hindustan Times. Earlier, he worked with Business Standard, DNA, The Economic Times, Mint and The Times of India. His longest stint was with Mint, where he spent more than eight years reporting across multiple beats. During his career, he has worked in both reporting and editing roles, contributing to page planning, local editions and special editorial projects as newsrooms evolved from print-first operations to digital publishing. Early in his career, he also worked on media and documentary projects with an NGO and as a copywriter at a communications agency before returning to journalism. Away from work, he sometimes makes time for a pair of binoculars, table tennis, cinema and the occasional poem.
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Home/India News/11-year-old boy killed in lion attack during Girnar pilgrimage in Gujarat
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