Amid simmering farm worry in Wayanad over human, animal face-off, Rahul Gandhi faces heat from LDF, BJP

On Tuesday, on the road leading to Vadakkanad village near Sulthan Bathery town in the Wayanad Lok Sabha constituency, Sulaiman is seen pulling down the shutters of his small tea shop at 6 pm. “It is too early to shut down, but travellers along this route are under constant threat from wild animals. People are scared to move on this road after dusk. Hence, there is no point in keeping the tea shop open,’’ he says.

The local villagers have been going to bed early every evening for the last three years since the threat from wild animals escalated in Wayanad, which is the worst-affected district on the score of human-animal conflict in Kerala.

The Wayanad Lok Sabha constituency encompasses Wayanad district and some segments of the adjoining Malappuram and Kozhikode districts. Vadakkand is among a large number of villages located in Wayanad’s forest belts, with the district having a nearly 36% forest cover.

A resident of Vadakkanad, Gopalan, a trader and newspaper agent, says: “After 7 pm, life is at the mercy of wild animals. Rarely do people venture out of their homes afterwards to make purchases. Those working outside the village ensure that they enter Vadakkand by early evening itself. Many youths, who are based not far away from the village, have opted to stay out in their places of work due to animal threat. Our children cannot go for a tuition class in a nearby town in the evening.”

Recounting the plight of villagers, a local farmer T Santhosh says, “Our region has vast tracts of agricultural land, but for the last three years I have not cultivated any vegetables or food crops. Last week also, a wild elephant came close to my house to pluck jackfruits after destroying the standing crops. By evening, herds of spotted deers