Indian business magnate Sridhar Vembu has shared his encounter with king cobra on social media and the post has gone viral. He tweeted two pictures of — hold your breath — a 12-foot king cobra that visited him recently. In one of the photos, we can see Mr Vembu, the CEO and founder of Zoho Corporation, and a group of forest rangers holding the snake.
He captioned it, “A rare 12 feet long King Cobra paid us a visit”. He added, “Our awesome local forest rangers arrived and caught it for release in the nearby hills. Here is the brave me attempting to touch it. A very auspicious day!”
Late in 2019, before the outbreak of the COVID-19 pandemic, Mr Vembu had moved to Mathalamparai, a village near Tenkasi in the picturesque Western Ghats in southern Tamil Nadu.
The post received over 3.4k likes within a few hours of being posted — no surprises there!
A rare 12 feet long King Cobra paid us a visit. Our awesome local forest rangers arrived and caught it for release in the nearby hills. Here is the brave me attempting to touch it ????
A very auspicious day! ???????????? pic.twitter.com/ipf5ss7sU5
— Sridhar Vembu (@svembu) September 21, 2021
Many users were stunned by pictures of the huge, magnificent snake. Some agreed with Mr Vembu about it being auspicious. One user wrote, “Super. Didn’t know Pothigai hills also had King cobras.”
Super ???? Didn’t know pothigai hills also had King cobras. I thought they were there only in the Karnataka and Maharashtra ranges of western ghats
— Gajamani | கஜாமணி | ಗಜಮಣಿ | ગજામણિ (@gajamani) September 21, 2021
One person criticised the snake-spotting celebration in a now-deleted tweet, to which Mr Vembu responded by saying that the presence of snakes indicates a healthy ecosystem. “If we make the whole ecosystem sterile, it won’t be just the snakes that we will lose,” he warned.
The presence of a lot of snakes indicates the health of the local environment. Therefore it is perfectly rational to celebrate the presence of snakes.
If we make the whole ecosystem sterile, it won’t be just the snakes that we will lose.
— Sridhar Vembu (@svembu) September 21, 2021
Some users were stunned by the size of the snake. A user commented, “That looks really big and scary.”
that looks really big and scary
— Rakesh Bhosale (@i_rakeshbhosale) September 21, 2021
Another user said that the snake could give anyone a “panic attack”. “If I was the one to have spotted such a large but magnificent creature, I’d have a major panic attack,” the comment read.
(NDTV)