With a police officer wounded and the presidential palace breached, a fresh offensive has been launched against a uniquely feared enemy in Islamabad — the city’s ever expanding population of wild boar.
Each night, packs of the hairy beasts emerge from Islamabad’s river beds, parks and scrubland to rifle through the overflowing rubbish bins of its mostly wealthy residents and growing number of restaurants.
City authorities are laying poison and have announced free hunting permits to cull the wild boars’ numbers. But to make sure residents don’t get caught in the crossfire, they only allow shotguns. There have been few takers. Hunters are wary of getting arrested by the police, or even worse — getting
mistaken for a terrorist.
The animals can weigh up to 180 to 220 pounds (80 kilograms to 100 kilograms) and have razor sharp teeth. Adult males come armed with upward curving tusks. While they scurry off at the site of humans, they charge when cornered, alarmed or wounded and are a major cause of traffic accidents in the city.
The latest chapter of man versus hog played out in a police station last week.
“Someone shouted ‘watch your back’ but before I could look round the animal had hit me,” said Sajjad Hussain, who was on duty when the animal slipped in past the high, razor wire-topped blast walls after guards opened the gates to let in a car.
Hussain had a gash in his stomach that required eight stitches and is onmedical leave.
The boar was even more unlucky. In his rush to escape, he bounded into a large pit where police barracks are being constructed. Trapped by high walls, he was an easy target for officers out to avenge their wounded
colleague. Not quite fish in a barrel, but close.
“The boar was like a terrorist. We shot him down,” said station chief Fayaz Tanooli. “I have told the guards if another boar gets in then they will be dismissed.”
The hogs have also encroached upon the lavish, not to mention tightly guarded, houses of the president and prime minister.
A team has been dispatched to lay poison mixed with molasses or maize, said Malik Aulya Khan, the city’s environmental chief.
“We are making special efforts. We have killed many with poison,” he said. “Somehow they enter under the fences.”
