25th Feb 2015.
Plight of Zoo Animals and the Foolish Man Who Stood on Tortoise !
Posted on the 07 July 2023 by Sampathkumar Sampath
People throng to Zoo to see and enjoy animals –
the one at Vandalur is sprawling and attracts huge crowds – far cry from the
days, it was housed in Lily Pond complex [Moore Market] nearer Central Station.
In 1979, the Tamil Nadu Forest Department set aside acres of land in the Vandalur Reserve Forest on the
outskirts of the city to build the current zoo
and the zoo in its new premises was officially opened to public in 1985
by the then chief minister of Tamil Nadu M.G. Ramachandran. It has high stream of visitors and receives
more than a lakh people every day during the Pongal holidays, especially on
Kanum Pongal day.
In some ways, all that is not good for the
animal housed there. Sadly, in Chennai
[so also in many other zoos in the Country] people do not follow the
instructions, especially the ‘don’ts’. The
Zoos are ‘no polybag’ zones – as plastic bags with left over snacks are thrown
into enclosures, animals might swallow them.
They can clog their digestive tract and suffocate the animals to death. There are many unruly elements which harm
those inside the enclosures. Before that
visitors should not feed the animals – they are not helping them by providing
food [of their choice like popcorn, wafers, biscuits etc.,] ~ that is
elementary, each animal has a different eating habit – visitors only harm them
by providing their choice food or leftovers !
The other bad habit is teasing animals – to
make them move around ~ people derive sadistic pleasure by Shouting, hissing,
making faces, throwing things, running in front of the cage, waving sticks –
trying to disturb and infuriate animals into action. Many tap the glass window in fish enclosure –
animals are shy and sensitive; they have their own routine. People often expect animals to be active all
the time, as though the animal wanted to meet and react to them at that precise
moment. It can bring a lot of stress on
the animal is what people fail to understand.
Then there are other nauseating behaviours of
throwing the waste into the enclosure, throwing stones on animals, spitting, smoking
and the like. Some months back, Nation
watched with horror when a youngman jumped into a tiger enclosure and was
mauled. Some were busy taking photos and videos of the incident and posting
them on social sites. Then experts (!)
started asking so many questions – what were the authorities doing ? why there
were no tranquilisers ?? – conveniently forgotten were the facts that it was a
wild animal enclosure, people were not expected to get nearer [certainly not
jump inside !]; some get closer for taking selfies with animal in the
background !; when crocodiles bask, it is common for people to throw something
on it including water bottle to check whether it is alive !!; then there are
drunk and hooligan elements too.
Here is one incident narrated in MailOnline
which sums up what one could see in many Zoos.
Fazal Shaik, 24, posed for picture on top of 120-year-old tortoise's
shell. The incident took place at Hyderabad city zoo after he jumped into
enclosure. He was arrested for wildlife offences after sharing picture on
social media. Shaik told police: 'I just
wanted to put it on Facebook so I'd get lots of likes' – the publicity stunt was
branded 'cruel' and 'stupid' by Nehru Zoological Park's curator.
25th Feb 2015.
25th Feb 2015.