A 19-year-old farm worker identified only as Talha was mauled to death by a tiger in Lahore last week while helping a social media influencer film content with the animal, Pakistani police said.
Talha worked at a private big-cat breeding farm and was assisting influencer Noman Hassan, who has millions of followers on TikTok and Instagram built around videos of himself roughhousing with dangerous animals, according to The Times of India. A criminal complaint reportedly states Hassan told Talha to remove the female tiger from its enclosure, and the animal killed him in the process.
After the attack, Hassan took Talha to a hospital and allegedly tried to tell doctors the teen had been bitten by a dog, not mauled by a tiger, police said.
Lahore Police described the incident on X as a “lioness attack,” though the photo they posted alongside the statement showed a tiger.
Both Hassan and the farm’s owner, identified as Fayyaz, have been arrested.
“A passion for TikTok cannot be more important than a human life,” a Lahore police spokesperson said. “No one can be allowed to put human life at risk in the name of a hobby or entertainment. The attempt to hide the facts and every aspect of negligence will be investigated.”
Under Pakistani law, private ownership of lions, tigers, cheetahs, pumas and jaguars is permitted as long as the animals are registered and the facility is located outside city limits. Police are now investigating whether the farm met those legal and safety requirements.
The case lands amid a broader crackdown on private big-cat ownership in Lahore, which began after an escaped lion attacked a mother and her two children on the city’s streets last year.
The Lahore mauling follows two other recent big-cat incidents abroad: a former child actor was killed by a tiger at a British wildlife park last month after climbing into its enclosure, and an Indian cattle herder survived a caught-on-camera lioness attack this summer after petting the animal like a house cat.
