From correspondents in Orissa, India, 11:31 AM IST

Four people have been arrested for killing leopards and possessing their skin in Orissa's Mayurbhanj district, a forest official said Sunday.

The four, including a former village council chief, were arrested Saturday from Pithapata, a village in Similipal Tiger Reserve, some 250 km from here.

'We have seized two leopard skins from them,' the reserve's field director Nagaraj Reddy told IANS.

'The four people seem to be professional poachers and may have killed the leopards in the reserve during the past eight months,' he said.

The reserve has around 200 leopards, Reddy added.

(Staff Writer, © IANS)