Fed up with the rodent menace, Dipak Jena, a farmer near Puri in eastern India, placed a mouse trap at his home on March 1 and promptly caught a rat.

But as a Hindu festival, Shivaratri, fell on March 1, he did not want to kill the rat on the auspicious day. He decided to release the rat at a distant place later and placed the trap outside his hut.

Later, in the evening a hungry cobra sensed the rat, and slithered into the mousetrap to prey on the hapless victim. Now, with a swollen belly the four-feet-long snake could not pass through the metal mesh of the trap, and found itself trapped.

Jena saw the trapped cobra and called Snake Helpline, which sent a member, Susant Kumar Behera, to rescue the snake.

Seeing approaching the rescuer, the cobra sensed danger and tried to get out frantically. When that failed it regurgitated its meal and tried to flee again. Susant gently captured the snake and released it in the wild later in the night. .

Snake Helpline General Secretary, Subhendu Mallik, said: "We frequently come across similar incidents. If manufacturers of mouse traps tighten the space in the mesh, snakes can be stopped from getting in easily.”