Bad timing or shoddy caring

According to Yeshwant Khaire, garden superintendent, 8220;All living things have to die at some time or the other. It isn8217;t as if the animals of one species are dying. That would point to some widespread infection and so on. Here, the animals belong to different species and are at different parks. It8217;s just a case of bad timing.8221;

What is extraordinary is that most of them have died well before their natural life-span. An elephant lives up to the average age of 60. Sharada died at 20. Wildlife experts cite reasons around one important issue 8212; the lack of a proper veterinarian to care for the animals. Says Shekhar Nanajkar, founder of WILD, a green group, 8220;The parks did not have a veterinarian to care for the animals. Dr Vinay Gorhe, the official vet and Dr P.N. Wagh were both working part-time.8221;

Khaire thinks this was enough, 8220;It8217;s not as if the animals were uncared for. Whenever they required treatment, these doctors who worked part-time with us were available.8221;

Additional Commissioner Deepak Kapoor is more forthright. 8220;Unfortunately, the zoo was not in our consciousness as say the garbage problem or the encroachment. So, it is true that it did not get the necessary attention it deserved.8221;

8220;From what I have observed, lack of adequate staff is one of the reasons that the Peshwe Park is what it is today. But I had a meeting with various NGOs and have already employed 50 bigaari workers to work at the zoo. Middle-level staff are adequate with one supervisor and two middle-level staffers. The problem was with appointment of the deputy superintendent and that was beyond our control.8221; 8220;This post was to be reserved for SC/ST. But, the case was taken to the Supreme Court and then there was no way we could fill this post as the matter was sub judice. The Court then ruled that since it is a single post, it should not be reserved. I took the interviews and selected the candidate in April and forwarded the proposal to the Public Works Committee. The matter was approved by the General Body only last month, and now Dr Kavzeen Umrigar who has studied in the U.K. has taken over as the veterinarian.8221;

While Kapoor appointed a veterinarian for the zoos albeit late, a peacock at Peshwe Park and one at Thorat Udyan died within a week of each other. Dr Umrigar said the first peacock died due to reasons beyond her control. 8220;The bird had broken her bone and that required surgery. If it was a plain fracture it would have healed itself, but sadly the bones were overlapping each other. Anaesthesia for birds is not possible unless we use isoflourine which is available only abroad or is too expensive to use here.8221;

The peacock from the Thorat Udyan died due to old age according to Umrigar. 8220;I8217;ve just finished the post morten and the bird died due to old age.8221;

But Nanajkar has a different story to tell. 8220;First of all, I don8217;t understand how the zoo authorities can conduct the post mortem of a bird that has died in their care. I know it for a fact that the peacock died because it inhaled the fumes from the paint and the thinner the park authorities had used to paint the grill near the cage. I went to the site myself and saw the spray paint on the grass near the cage.

8220;Spray-painting is not the best way to paint cage grills and I don8217;t understand why this was used. Unfortunately, the peacock who had shed his feathers and had his crest missing was at a disadvantage as he could not fly very high. While the parrots flew to the top of the high cage and the rabbits went into their burrows, the poor peacock was trapped. As a result, he had some convulsions and died shortly afterward.8221;

Kapoor explains, 8220;The bird died at 5.30 p.m. and the disease investigation centre closes at 6 p.m. Had we waited for the next morning, then the allegation would have been that we deliberately avoided a post mortem on time. Anyway samples of the bird8217;s organs and fluids have been sent to the DIC for examination and the report will be available shortly.8221;

Dr Umrigar also refutes Nanajkar8217;s claim saying, 8220;I have examined the alimentary canal and the respiratory tract and there were no traces of paint. It died of old age.8221; Can the zoo authorities be trusted to reveal all? Early this week, the post mortem report of the cow-elephant was submitted by the Disease Investigation Centre. The PMC released the report stating septicemia as the cause of the death.

But what caused the septicemia? Says Dr Sumathi Ramachandran, a private practitioner 8220;Septicemia can be caused due to several factors. It could be a viral infection, a bacterial or a wound or any other reason. In such cases, the animal would have become dull and listless, it can even run a temperature. But without knowing the cause of the septicemia, it8217;s hard to say anything.8221;

After several calls, Khaire admitted that the septicemia was 8220;possibly caused due to a bacterial infection.8221; If that was the case why was the animal not treated in time? Says Khaire 8220;We did our best. You must realise that animals are not like us and diagnosing problems is very difficult. When the symptoms do appear, it is often too late. In fact, we even called up a specialist on elephants, a Dr Panicker, in Kerala for advice and gave Sharada antibiotic injections subsequently. But it was too late.8221;

Like the appointment of the veterinarian to care for the animals, seems like care provided to Sharada was too late. Following the deaths, Kapoor introduced a ban on plastic in the zoo and visitors are now physically frisked. This move is resented by people visiting the zoo. Says Kapoor, 8220;We are running the zoo to keep the animals safe and not to please people.8221;

Meanwhile, Puneites can only hope that the birds and animals in the zoos, many of whom are endangered species, are not lost to disease and bad timing8217;.