Man sees snake, man bites snake

22 August 2014 - 02:26 By ©The Daily Telegraph
subscribe Just R20 for the first month. Support independent journalism by subscribing to our digital news package.
Subscribe now

A man in central India killed a venomous blue krait snake by biting it after he saw it slithering towards him in his bed.

Rai Singh, from Chhattisgarh, told a local television channel he feared that the blue krait would bite him and decided to bite it instead.

"At nine o'clock in the evening while I went to sleep on my bed, I saw a snake and tried to shoo it away with a stick but it attacked me. I bit it," he told a local television channel.

His neighbour, RS Singh, said it was a miracle that Singh survived "since this snake is highly venomous".

In India, 50000 people are killed by venomous bites every year. The krait is nocturnal and often wriggles into homes at night during the monsoon season to keep dry.

Its bites rarely cause pain and often go unnoticed by their victims as they sleep. They are, however, highly poisonous and up to 80% of their victims die after suffering progressive paralysis.

subscribe Just R20 for the first month. Support independent journalism by subscribing to our digital news package.
Subscribe now