This is an uncorrected proof. Figures Abstract Background Snakebite envenoming is a significant global health crisis that has been long neglected as a global health priority. It is a huge problem for rural communities of low and middle-income countries, India accounts for the largest proportion of snakebite deaths globally. Timely identification of venomous snakebite and its syndromic pattern is essential for effective administration of antivenom and supportive treatment. Expert identification of snake species and syndromes is not always available in peripheral healthcare settings. This leads to delays, unnecessary referrals, or improper treatment choices. Additionally, diverse snake species distribution and venom variations across regions pose challenges. AI-powered image classification methods can help overcome these barriers. We propose a clinically oriented deep learning pipeline for binary classification of venomous and non-venomous snake species of India using real-world imagery data. This pipeline would serve as a baseline step towards aiding snakebite management at peripheral healthcare setups with scarce resources. Methods The selected dataset consisted of 20 medically important Indian species. MobileViT-S, ConvNeXt-Tiny, EfficientNet-V2-S and ResNeXt-50 (32 × 4d) were trained under same conditions for comparison of results. Model interpretability was evaluated using Grad-CAM ++ to ensure that classification was not performed based on background but on features like head shape and stripes present on body. For reliable implementation we connected it to a web interface with human in loop expert verification. Experts can confirm or override predictions in real time. Results Among the evaluated architectures, ResNeXt-50 (32 × 4d) showed the most reliable and consistent performance in classifying venomous and non-venomous snakes. It achieved the highest test accuracy, sensitivity, specificity, and F1-score. The model also had strong discriminative ability, with a ROC-AUC of 0.9950 and PR-AUC of 0.9959. These results indicate dependable performance in safety-critical screening situations. Grad-CAM++ visualizations confirmed that predictions were