Your Mission: Operation

Destination: Sanjay Gandhi National Forest, Mumbai Local contact: Young Innovators Foundation Priority Status: Urgent, life and death consequences Briefing details: Enclosed

Operation Leopard Briefing memo

Operation Leopard

Terminology MKP1 = Masti ki Paathshala (fun, learning center), a YIF-operated school for tribal population in the Sanjay Gandhi National Park next to Mumbai, . Tumni Pada = Name of informal village inside Sanjay Gandhi National Park where students of MKP1 live. YIF = Young Innovators Foundation, a non-profit youth empowerment organization founded by Ritika Arya and staffed by dozens of young social innovators.

Briefing memo from Ritika Arya of YIF:

We walked along with the children to the source of water in the jungle and this is what we learnt first hand:

1. The approx. distance for the people walking from Tumni Pada to the “tank”, a natural spring well water source, is 1 kilometer so they need to walk approx. 2 kilometers (going and coming) in order to fetch water. The water is not potable so villagers boil it prior to drinking it. 2. The children said that often times their parents have seen the leopard drinking water from the same source. 3. The elders go to fill water at dawn, usually the kids are not sent, and they go in groups, carrying sticks with them. The children said that they make sounds using their mouth, using the pots and sometimes hit larger stones on the way with the stick. 4. Many who have cycles load the water back on their cycles and the rest come back on foot. 5. At any given time the elders carry about 20 to 30 litres of water back home, sometimes the water lasts until afternoon and sometimes unto evening when they go back to fetch more. Mostly children go later in the morning, in the afternoon or in the evening, always in groups of 2-3 or more. 6. On an average each household needs about 60 litres of water each day for drinking, bathing, cooking, washing clothes, utensils, and watering their plants. 7. The water is fetched in metal pots and plastic containers on their head and around their waist usually. 8. We have been able to share only the path from Tumni Pada to the source and back but the children disclosed that there are many remote villages in the national park (that are worse off in terms of connectivity and access to resources) that rely on other sources and also this one that they rely on. 9. There are about 81 people living in this village and about half or more than half the number comprises of children. Every village has a different population; this one is one of the smaller ones. 10. Leopard attacks have occurred on the path and as close as in the village itself. Approximately twenty five attacks have occurred in recent years.

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Operation Leopard Briefing memo

11. The people at Tumni are not permitted to cut down trees but can collect fallen branches and sticks as fuel wood. They can cut from an already fallen tree. They do have vines and long branches around that they can and do use. Typical income in Tumni pada is anywhere between 4500 and 7000 Indian Rupee ($1 US Dollar = 55 Indian Rupee) per month depending upon the work they do and also the season. With this income, the villagers eat rice and lentils. Occasionally, they can afford to eat vegetables and fruit. They cannot afford meat. 12. Most families borrow money from a neighbor to even out cash flow shortfalls due to the irregularity of their work. This means that most families have times when they don’t have enough money to meet their basic needs, so they borrow money from neighbors who happen to have a small surplus of money at that time. Neighbors are willing to loan each other money even though they are poor because they all have suffered cash shortfalls during the month and thus rely on each other for short term loans which they pay back over weeks and months. As a reference, those who live on the streets in Mumbai earn approximately 1500 Indian Rupee per month, which is insufficient to meet their basic necessities. 13. The adults typically walk 2 – 3 kilometers to Mumbai to work each day. The men usually wait on street corners hoping to obtain work as day laborers performing manual work for just that day. Often the men find no work for that day. The women usually work as domestic servants in the housing societies (high-rise apartments for middle-income families). During the day, the children are left on their own back in the villages. There are no schools for them other than the MKP’s operated by YIF. 14. The bicycle in the photos was rented by Ritika and her volunteer team for the day in the jungle. Most villagers have difficulty affording bicycles.

Please note that as the problem gets solved in one place, the solution can be adapted to help the other villages.

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Operation Leopard Briefing memo

Leopard

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Leopard

The leopard (pron.: /ˈlɛpərd/), Panthera pardus, is a member of the Felidae family and the smallest of the four "big cats" in the genusPanthera, the other three being the , , and . The leopard was once distributed across eastern and southern Asia and Africa, from Siberia to , but its range of distribution has decreased radically because of hunting and loss of habitat. It is now chiefly found in sub-Saharan Africa; there are also fragmented populations in the , Sri Lanka, Indochina, Malaysia, Indonesia, and . Because of its declining range and population, it is listed as a "Near Threatened" species on the IUCN Red List.[1] Compared to other members of the Felidae family, the leopard has relatively short legs and a long body with a large skull. It is similar in appearance to the jaguar, but is smaller and more slightly built. Its fur is marked with rosettes similar to those of the jaguar, but the leopard's rosettes are smaller and more densely packed, and do not usually have central spots as the do. Both and jaguars that are melanistic are known as black panthers.

The species' success in the wild is in part due to its opportunistic hunting behavior, its adaptability to habitats, its ability to run at speeds approaching 58 kilometres per hour (36 mph), its unequaled ability to climb trees even when carrying a heavy carcass,[2] and its notorious ability for stealth. The leopard consumes virtually any animal that it can hunt down and catch. Its habitat ranges from rainforest to desert terrains.

Description Leopards are agile and stealthy predators. Although they are smaller than other members of the Panthera genus, they are able to take large prey due to their massive skulls that facilitate powerful jaw muscles. Head and body length is usually between 90 and 165 cm (35 and 65 in). The tail reaches 60 to 110 cm (24 to 43 in) long, around the same length as the tiger's tail and relatively the longest tail in thePanthera genus (though snow leopards and the much smaller marbled cats are relatively longer tailed).[3][4] Shoulder height is from 45 to 80 cm (18 to 31 in). The muscles attached to the scapula are exceptionally strong, which enhance their ability to climb trees. They are very diverse in size. Males are about 30% larger than females, weighing 30 to 91 kg (66 to 200 lb) compared to 23 to 60 kg (51 to 130 lb) for females. Large males of up to 91 kg (200 lb) have been documented in in South Africa; however, males in South Africa's coastal mountains average 31 kg (68 lb) and the females from the desert-edge in Somalia average 23 to 27 kg (51 to 60 lb). This wide variation in size is thought to result from the quality and availability of prey found in each habitat. The most diminutive leopard subspecies overall is the Arabian leopard (P. p. nimr), from deserts of the Middle East, with adult females of this race weighing as little as 17 kg (37 lb).[5][6]

Other large subspecies, in which males weigh up to 91 kg (200 lb), are the Sri Lankan leopard (P. p. kotiya) and the Anatolian leopard (P. p. tulliana). Such larger leopards tend to be found in areas which lack and , thus putting the leopard at the top of the food chain with no competitive restriction from large prey items.[7] The largest verified leopards weighed 96.5 kg (213 lb) and can reach 190 cm (75 in) in head-and-body length. Larger sizes have been reported but are generally considered unreliable.[8][4] The leopard's body is comparatively long, and its legs are short.[9]

Leopards show a great diversity in coat color and rosette patterns. Their rosettes are circular in East Africa but tend to be squarer in southern Africa and larger in Asian populations. Their yellow coat tends to be more pale and cream colored in desert populations, more gray in colder climates, and of a darker golden hue in rainforest habitats. Overall, the fur under the belly tends to be lighter coloured and of a softer, downy type. Solid black spots in place of open rosettes are generally seen along the face, limbs and underbelly.[5] Leopards may sometimes be confused with two other large spotted cats, the cheetah, with which it may co-exist in Africa, and the jaguar, a neotropical species that it does not naturally co-exist with. However, the patterns of spots in each are different: the cheetah has simple black spots, evenly spread; the jaguar has small spots inside the polygonalrosettes; while the leopard normally has rounder, smaller rosettes than those of the jaguar. The cheetah has longer legs and a thinner build that makes it look more streamlined and taller but less powerfully built

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Operation Leopard Briefing memo

than the leopard. The jaguar is more similar in build to the leopard but is generally larger in size and has a more muscular, bulky appearance.[10]

Leopards are elusive, solitary and largely nocturnal.[36][37] They have primarily been studied in open savanna habitats, which may have biased common descriptions. Activity level varies depending on the habitat and the type of prey that they hunt. Radio-tracking and scat analysis in West Africa showed that rainforest leopards are more likely to be diurnal and crepuscular. Forest leopards are also more specialized in prey selection and exhibit seasonal differences in activity patterns.[38] Leopards are known for their ability in climbing, and have been observed resting on tree branches during the day, dragging their kills up trees and hanging them there, and descending from trees headfirst.[39] They are powerful swimmers, although are not as disposed to swimming as some other big cats, such as the tiger. They are very agile, and can run at over 58 kilometres per hour (36 mph), leap over 6 metres (20 ft) horizontally, and jump up to 3 metres (9.8 ft) vertically.[40] They produce a number of vocalizations, including grunts, roars, growls, meows, and "sawing" sounds.[41]

Hunting and diet

Leopards are versatile, opportunistic hunters, and have a very broad diet. They feed on a greater diversity of prey than other members of the Panthera species, and will eat anything from dung beetles to 900 kg (2,000 lb) male common elands, though prey usually weighs considerably less than 200 kg (440 lb) .[5] Their diet consists mostly of ungulates, followed byprimates, primarily monkeys of various species, including the Vervet monkey. However, they will also opportunistically eat rodents, reptiles, amphibians, insects, birds (especially ground- based types like the Vulturine Guineafowl), fish and sometimes smaller predators (such as foxes, jackals, martens and smaller felid species). In at least one instance, a leopard has predated a sub- adult Nile crocodile that was crossing over land.[46] Leopards are the only natural predators of adult chimpanzees and gorillas, although the cat may sometimes choose to avoid these as they are potentially hazardous prey, especially large male silverback gorillas.[47][48] They stalk their prey silently, pounce on it at the last minute, and strangle its throat with a quick bite. In Africa, mid-sizedantelopes provide a majority of their prey, especially impala and Thomson's gazelles.[49] In the open savanna of Tsavo National Park, they kill most of their prey while hunting between sunset and sunrise.[50] In Kruger National Park, males and females with cubs are more active at night. At least 92 prey species have been documented in their diet. They focus their hunting activity on locally abundant medium-sized ungulate species in the 20 to 80 kg (44 to 180 lb) range, while opportunistically taking other prey. Analysis of leopard scats found that 67% contained ungulate remains, of which 60% were impala, the most abundant antelope, with adult weights of 40 to 60 kg (88 to 130 lb). Small mammal remains were found most often in scats of sub-adult leopards, especially females. Average daily consumption rates was estimated at 3.5 kg (7.7 lb) for adult males and 2.8 kg (6.2 lb) for females.[51]

In Asia, the leopard primarily preys on deer such as chitals and muntjacs, as well as various Asian antelopes and ibex. Prey preference estimates in southern India showed that the most favored prey of the leopard were chitals.[52] A study at the Wolong Reserve in China revealed how adaptable their hunting behaviour is. Over the course of seven years, the vegetative cover receded, and the animals opportunistically shifted from primarily consuming tufted deer to pursuing bamboo ratsand other smaller prey.[53]

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Operation Leopard Briefing memo

They select their prey focusing on small herds, dense habitat, and low risk of injury, preferring prey weights of 10 to 40 kg (22 to 88 lb) such as impala, chital, bushbuck andcommon duiker with an average body weight of 25 kg (55 lb).[54]

In search of safety, leopards often stash their young or recent kills high up in a tree, which can be a great feat of strength considering that they may be carrying prey heavier than themselves in their the mouth while they climb vertically.[49] One leopard was seen to haul a young giraffe, estimated to weigh up to 125 kg (280 lb), more than twice the weight of the cat, up 5.7 m (19 ft) into a tree.[50]

Most leopards avoid people, but humans may occasionally be targeted as prey. Most healthy leopards prefer wild prey to humans, but injured, sickly, or struggling cats or those with a shortage of regular prey may resort to hunting humans and become habituated to it. Although usually slightly smaller than a human, an adult leopard is much more powerful and easily capable of killing them. Two extreme cases occurred in India: the first leopard, "the Leopard of ", killed more than 125 people; the second, the "Panar Leopard", was believed to have killed more than 400. Both were killed by the renowned hunter .[79] Man-eating leopards are considered bold and difficult to track by feline standards and may enter human settlements for prey, more so than lions and tigers.[80] Author and big game hunter Kenneth Anderson had first-hand experience with many man- eating leopards, and described them as far more threatening than tigers: Although examples of such animals are comparatively rare, when they do occur they depict the panther [leopard] as an engine of destruction quite equal to his far larger cousin, the tiger. Because of his smaller size he can conceal himself in places impossible to a tiger, his need for water is far less, and in veritable demoniac cunning and daring, coupled with the uncanny sense of self preservation and stealthy disappearance when danger threatens, he has no equal. —Kenneth Anderson, Nine Man-Eaters and One Rogue, Chapter II "The Spotted Devil of Gummalapur""

Leopard attack From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Leopard_attack

The Gunsore man-eater after it was shot by British officer W. A. Conduitt on 21 April 1901. Credited with at least 20 human deaths, the leopard was killed on top of its last victim, a child from Somnapur village in the , India.[1] Leopard attacks on humans are generally rare occurrences. Despite the leopard's (Panthera pardus) extensive range from sub-Saharan Africa to , attacks are regularly reported only n India and .[2][3] Among the four "big cats," leopards are less likely to become man-eaters— only jaguars have a less fearsome reputation.[4][5] There are no known records of snow leopards (Panthera uncia) attacking humans.[6][5] However, leopards are established predators of non-human , sometimes preying on species as large as the western lowland gorilla.[7] Other primates may make up 80% of the leopard's diet.[8] While leopards generally avoid humans, they tolerate proximity to humans better than lionsand tigers and often come into conflict with humans when raiding livestock.[9] Leopard attacks may have peaked in India during the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, coinciding with rapid urbanization.[4] Attacks in India are still relatively common, and in some regions of the country leopards kill more humans than all other large combined.[10][11] The Indian states of , Himachal

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Operation Leopard Briefing memo

Pradesh, , , and experience the most severe human–leopard conflict. In Nepal, most attacks occur in the midland regions (the , midhills, and lesser Himalaya).[3] One study concluded that the rate of leopard predation on humans in Nepal is 16 times higher than anywhere else, resulting in approximately 1.9 human deaths annually per million inhabitants.[3]Globally, attacks on humans—especially nonfatal attacks that result in only minor injury—likely remain under-reported due to the lack of monitoring programs and standardized reporting protocol.[12]

Leopard predation on hominids In 1970 South African paleontologist C. K. Brain showed that a juvenile individual, SK 54, had been killed by a leopard at in Gauteng, South Africa approximately 1.8 million years ago.[13][14] The SK 54 cranium bears two holes in the back of the skull—holes that perfectly match the width and spacing of lower leopard canine teeth. The leopard appears to have dragged its kill into a tree to eat in seclusion, much like leopards do today.[13] Numerous leopard fossils have been found at the site, suggesting that the felids were predators of early hominids.[15] The revelation that these injuries were not the result of interpersonal aggression but were leopard-inflicted dealt a fatal blow to the then-popular killer ape theory.[16] Another hominid fossil consisting of a 6-million-year-old tugenensis femur (BAR 1003'00), recovered from the Tugen Hills inKenya, preserves puncture damage tentatively identified as leopard bite marks.[17] This fossil evidence, along with modern studies of –leopard interaction, has fueled speculation that leopard predation played a major role in primate evolution, particularly on cognitive development.[18]

Human–leopard conflict Reducing human–leopard conflict has proven difficult. Conflict tends to increase during periods of drought or when the leopard's natural prey becomes scarce. Shrinking leopard habitat and growing human populations also increase conflict. In , retaliatory attacks on humans increased when starving villagers began expropriating leopard kills (a feeding strategy known as kleptoparasitism).[19] The economic damage resulting from loss of livestock to carnivores caused villagers in 's Jigme Singye Wangchuck National Park to lose more than two- thirds of their annual cash income in 2000, with leopards blamed for 53% of the losses.[20] Similarly, in the Annapurna Conservation Area of Nepal, the estimated monetary loss per household was US$95 in 2009 and US$42 in 2010 (out of an annual income of less than US$100), with leopards blamed for 94.9% of the losses.[21]Like other large carnivores, leopards are capable of . Under normal conditions, prey are too scarce for this behavior, but when the opportunity presents itself leopards may instinctually kill in excess for later consumption.[22] One leopard in Cape Province, South Africa killed 51 sheep and lambs in a single incident.[23] Translocation (the capture, transport, and release) of "problem leopards," as with other territorial felids, is generally ineffective: translocated leopards either immediately return or other leopards move in and claim the vacant territory. One translocated leopard in Cape Province traveled nearly 500 kilometres (310 mi) to return to his old territory.[24]Translocations are also expensive, tend to result in high mortality (up to 70%), and may make leopards more aggressive towards humans, thus failing as both a management and a conservation strategy.[25][26][27][28] Historically, lethal control of problem animals was the primary method of conflict management.

Although this remains the situation in many countries,[27] leopards are afforded the highest legal protection in India under the Wildlife Protection Act of 1972—only man-eaters can be killed and only when they are considered likely to continue to prey on humans.[29] In Uttarakhand, the state with the most severe human–leopard conflict, 45 leopards were legally declared man-eaters and shot by wildlife officials between 2001 and 2010.[2]

Where legal, herders may shoot at leopards who prey on their livestock. An injured leopard may become an exclusive predator of livestock if it is unable to kill normal prey, since domesticated animals typically lack natural defenses.[30] Frequent livestock-raiding may cause leopards to lose their fear of humans, and shooting injuries may have caused some leopards to become man-eaters. There has been increasing acceptance that the "problem leopard" paradigm may be anthropomorphization of normal behavior, and that translocations are unlikely to stop livestock depredation.[30][2] In an effort to reduce the shooting of "problem leopards" and lessen the financial burden on herders, some governments provide monetary compensation, although the sum is often less than the value of the lost livestock.[2]

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Operation Leopard Briefing memo

Number of Human Deaths due to Leopard Attacks† Country Region Deaths Year(s) Ref ‡ [31] Indian subcontinent 11,909 1875–1912 [9] Bhagalpur district, 350 1959–1962 [32] Uttarakhand 239 2000–2007 [33] Throughout India (mainly Uttarakhand) 170 1982–1989 [34] , Uttarakhand 140 1988–2000 [35] , Uttarakhand 125 1918–1926 [36] Gujarat 105 1994–2007 [16] 95 1988–1998 [37] Junagadh district, Gujarat 29 1990–2012 India [11] Pune district, Maharashtra 18 2001–2003 [38] Jammu and Kashmir 17 2004–2007 [9] Sanjay Gandhi National Park, Maharashtra 16 1986–1996 [39] North Bengal 15 1990–2008 [40] Mandi district, 13 1987–2007 [11] Chikkamagaluru district, 11 1995 [41] Kanha National Park, 8 1961–1965 [32] Himachal Pradesh 6 2000–2007 [49] Luangwa River 8 1938 † No comprehensive global database of fatal leopard attacks exists, and many countries do not keep official records. Due to the fragmentary nature of the data, the deaths reproduced here should be considered minimum figures only.

Man-eaters Characteristics The leopard is largely a nocturnal hunter. For its size, it is the most powerful large felid, able to drag a carcass larger than itself up a tree.[50] Leopards can run more than 60 kilometres per hour (37 mph), leap more than 6 metres (20 ft) horizontally and 3 metres (9.8 ft) vertically, and have a more developed sense of smell than tigers.[50] They are strong climbers and can descend down a tree headfirst.[50] Man-eating leopards have earned a reputation as being particularly bold and difficult to track. British hunters Jim Corbett (1875–1955) and Kenneth Anderson (1910–1974) wrote that hunting leopards presented more challenges than any other animal.[6][51] Indian naturalist J. C. Daniel (1927–2011), former curator of the Bombay Natural History Society, reprinted many early twentieth-century accounts of man-eating leopards in his book The Leopard in India: A Natural History (Dehradun: Natraj Publishers, 2009). One such account in the Journal of the Bombay Natural History Society describes the unique danger posed by leopards:

Like the tiger, the panther [leopard] sometimes takes to man-eating, and a man-eating panther is even more to be dreaded than a tiger with similar tastes, on account of its greater agility, and also its greater stealthiness and silence. It can stalk and jump, and...can climb better than a tiger, and it can also conceal itself in astonishingly meager cover, often displaying uncanny intelligence in this act. A man-eating panther frequently breaks through the frail walls of village huts and carries away children and even adults as they lie asleep.[9]

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Operation Leopard Briefing memo

One study concluded that only 9 of 152 documented man-eating leopards were female.[52] Drawing on the sex and physical condition of 78 man-eating leopards, the same study concluded that man-eaters were typically uninjured mature males (79.5%), with a fewer number of aged and immature males (11.6% and 3.8%, respectively).[52] Once a leopard has killed and eaten a human, they are likely to persist as man-eaters—they may even show a nearly exclusive preference for humans.[14] Corbett wrote that theRudraprayag man-eater once broke into a pen holding 40 goats, but instead of attacking the livestock it killed and ate the sleeping 14-year-old boy who had been assigned to guard them.

Leopard attacks on humans tend to occur at night, and often close to villages. There have been documented incidents of leopards forcing their way into human dwellings at night and attacking the inhabitants in their sleep.[12] A number of fatal attacks have also occurred in zoos and homes with pet leopards.[53][54][55][56] During predatory attacks, leopards typically bite their prey's throat or the nape of the neck, lacerating or severing jugular veins and carotid arteries, causing rapid exsanguination. The spine may be crushed and the skull perforated, exposing the brain.[53][54][38] Survivors of attacks typically suffer extensive trauma to the head, neck, and face. Multibacterial infection resulting from the contamination of wounds by leopard oral flora occurs in 5–30% of attack survivors, complicating recovery.[53] Before the advent of antibiotics, 75% of attack survivors died from infection.[57] In 1899 British officer H. G. C. Swayne (1860–1940) wrote of a man-eating leopard that had killed more than 100 humans in the Golis Mountains of . Swayne's brief account appears in the volume Great and Small Game of Africa (: Roland Ward, 1899), edited by the prominent British naturalist Henry Bryden (1854–1937):

In 1889 there was a leopard, said to be a panther, which had haunted the Mirso ledge of the Golis range for some years, and was supposed to have killed over a hundred people. It was in the habit of lying in wait at a corner of a very dark, rough jungle path, where huge rocks overlooked the track; and the Somalis used to show a boulder, some 6 feet high, a yard from the path, in the flat top of which was a depression shaped like a panther's body, from which the beast was said to spring upon travellers.[46]

According to Swayne, leopards were more abundant in the Golis Mountains than anywhere else in British Somaliland, and were responsible for 90% of all attacks on sheep and goats. The rocky terrain of the Golis made tracking and killing leopards next to impossible.[46] At the time of the attacks, this remote territory remained largely unexplored by the British, and little else is known of the Golis Range man-eater.

British hunter Jim Corbett poses after shooting theRudraprayag leopard on 2 May 1926. Estimated to have killed more than 125 people in Uttarakhand, India between 1918 and 1926, it was perhaps the third most prolific man-eater after the Panar leopard and the Central Provinces leopard. In 1903 L. S. Osmaston (1870–1969), a conservator employed by the Imperial Forestry Service, reported that a man-eating leopard had killed more than 30 humans in the Mulher Valley between 1901 and 1902.[59] Osmaston twice set out to kill the leopard in February and March 1902, but was unsuccessful. His forestry work required him to leave Mulher later that month, and he was unable to return until late November. The leopard's last attack occurred a few days later on 3 December:

I heard a boy of 15 had been killed at Wadai, 4 miles from my camp; this boy was most unfortunate. Last year the panther had tried to get him, but only mauled one leg; my wife and I were able to dose the wound with carbolic oil and the boy got well; this time he and one or two others were sitting close to a bright fire on a threshing floor near the village in the early part of the night and the panther came and carried him off: the panther took him about a quarter of a mile to a patch of high grass and brushwood and ate all he could of the head, the flesh of one leg and all his inside; so there was plenty left for the beast to come back for.[59]

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