Pune Faces Leopard Sightings and AI-Generated Panic

“Every fake image or AI-generated video forces our teams to divert time, vehicles, and manpower to verify false claims. This directly affects real rescue operations and public safety. Such misinformation can trigger panic, crowding, and even lead to wrong responses during an actual wildlife incident. We urge citizens not to forward unverified messages. Those found deliberately creating or circulating fake content will be booked under relevant sections of the law.”

“We have also come across AI-generated videos in which people have added leopards to CCTV footage. We fail to understand why people are doing this.”

“We have been dealing with a very high number of AI-generated leopard images which are circulated in housing society WhatsApp groups and on social media creating unnecessary fear among the citizens. In many cases, these messages are coming to us through public representatives who are receiving them from local citizens. And a large chunk of these messages are turning out to be AI generated images, videos or old videos circulated as new accompanied by false claims.”

“Because we are utilising our resources in verification of these messages, the real response efforts are delayed because teams must first verify whether an incident is genuine or not. Because of this problem, we will now be registering criminal cases against those who create these AI-generated images and videos and are knowingly circulating it. We have already held a meeting with the police officials in this regard. As a starting point, we have issued notices to some individuals and have called them for questioning.”