HYDERABAD, India—Panic gripped Hetero Group’s pharmaceutical manufacturing plant here after a leopard was spotted inside the building in the early morning hours of Dec. 18. 

Hetero Group staff contacted officials with the local forestry department at dawn and forwarded a video of the leopard on the prowl inside the plant, according to district forest officer Sridhar Rao. Soon, forestry officials and two veterinarians from Nehru Zoological Park in Hyderabad reached the plant to capture the animal, a four-year-old male leopard.

“The animal must have strayed into the plant from the Narsapur forest area. We successfully tranquilized it and temporarily shifted it to Nehru Zoological Park. After medical examination, we will translocate it to Amrabad Tiger Reserve,” Sridhar says.

Video shows the leopard trapped inside a 100-foot wide room inside the plant. The cat can be seen aggressively trying to smash the glass to find a way out.

It was not the first leopard encounter for the factory. In April, security cameras recorded a leopard stalking the factory property. And, in November, a leopard killed two calves near Nathnaipally village, which is close to the factory.

Because the factory is located near Narsapur Urban Forest Park, a forest preserve covering more than 30 square kilometers, leopard sightings are common, especially during winter.

Forest officials said they do not yet know how the leopard entered the factory, but suspect it could have sneaked in through a large drain pipe leading into the plant.