Presence of a full grown striped hyena within Durgapur town sparked off sensation but the creature however fell victim of a hit-and-run case here early this morning.

The carcass of the hyena was found lying beside the arterial road in Ward 8 of the town that’s close to the City Centre administrative and business corridor here. “It’s killed by a speeding vehicle that rammed the hyena while the animal was crossing the arterial road,” said Sumon Deb Mallik, a forest guard who’d come to the locality to recover the carcass. The range officer, social forestry, Durgapur, Chiranjit Saha said: “Stripped hyenas are increasing besides the Ajoy riverbank, about 25 km from town and are visible often in the neighbouring rural areas, but their presence in the busy urban areas establish their population is breeding successfully.”

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Mamoni Baske, a housewife of the locality where the hyena was killed, said: “Since more than a month, this animal was frequently appearing from this little jungle patch. We were frightened.” Subhas Das, another resident, said: “It has killed goats and chicken in last few days.” Forest officials gathered CCTV footage from a nearby refuelling station to help identifying the culprit vehicle.

Hyenas are seen in Madhaigunj, Jamuria, Laudoha, Pandaveswar coalmine areas and in Garh jungle, where Indian wolf population is on the rise in Kanksa since five years. The IUCN (International Union for Conservation of Nature) have listed the Indian stripped hyenas as ‘near threatened’ animal.