Nalgonda: After a six hour-long rescue operation, Forest officials managed to capture a sloth bear that had wandered into a residential area in Srinivasa Colony here and shifted it to a forest area for release.
The sloth bear was first spotted in a bathroom on the premises of the house of Thandu Srinivas in Srinivasa Colony on Sunday morning.
Scared on hearing the screams of family members of Srinivas, the bear ran into another building, which was under construction, in the colony located behind the local D-Mart outlet.
On being alerted by local residents, police and Forest officials rushed to the colony and took up measures to capture the sloth bear and to prevent it from running through the colony again.
On the request of district officials, a rescue team of the Forest department too reached Suryapet from Warangal to rescue the bear.
Energy Minister G Jagadish Reddy, who was in the district, also reached Srinivasa Colony and instructed officials to rescue the bear without harming it.
According to Forest officials, efforts to tranquilize the bear did not work, which delayed the rescue operation. The bear was finally captured caught using special nets.
The bear was reportedly sighted at Tirumalgiri and Arvepally in the district recently, and is believed to have wandered into Srinivasa Colony from there. Officials said it would be released into the nearby forests.