Five horses died of hunger in Kolkata

Kolkata,07 April(HS): In a heart rendering tragic incident at least 5 horses have died in Kolkata Maidan area during the past one week, possibly with hunger and some disease, bringing a pall of gloom and a sense of defeat among the people particularly among the city’s animal lovers for failing to save the lives of these poor animals.

These horses along with about 70 others were being used for the entertainment of a large number of tourists in and around the city’s several popular tourist spots like those surrounding Victoria Memorial and large Maidan area every day till the breakout of COVID-19 pandemic. Some of them were also used for a number of horse-drawn decorated carriages for tourists and for marriage purposes.

Though the exact reason or causes for the death of 5 five such beautiful animals is not yet known, according to their owners, they failed to provide them sufficient food during the lockdown period because of the strict restrictions on their movement by the police.

We could not bring them enough grass or leaf because we were prevented from leaving our houses by the authorities’, said some of the hapless owners in unison.

However, as the news of the unfortunate death of these horses was spread through social media, senior officials of the Mounted Police Division of Kolkata Police rushed to the spot where the remaining horses were kept and took them to its own centre so that these poor animals could be looked after in a better way and that they could have enough food.

Meanwhile, expressing serious concern at the possibility of further continuing the locked down in the state in view of the unabated danger to the people because of COVID-19, the owners of these horses said since there was absolutely no income for them for the past one month in absence of any tourist or visitor in the Maidan area, they were also at the brink of facing an economic disaster apart from continuous hunger.

‘But thanks to the efforts of some NGOs and government agencies we are being able to survive with the least’, they said but deeply regretted that they could not provide sufficient food to their horses and saw them dying ‘in front of our own eyes which was no less horrible by any yardstick’.