It was supposed to be a simple animal exchange for a zoo, but alas! It turned into a circus. The names Akbar and Sita were assigned to a lion and lioness, respectively. That was enough for the Vishwa Hindu Parishad (VHP), an organization claiming to speak for Hindus worldwide, to take offence and approach the court seeking justice.
Yes, you read that right. They moved the circuit bench of the Calcutta High Court in Jalpaiguri district against the North Bengal Wild Animals Park in Siliguri. And the court thought the matter merited its attention.
On February 12, the two big cats, which were originally at Tripura’s Sepahijala Zoo, were transferred to Siliguri with eight more animals. The VHP alleged in its writ petition that the names chosen for the animals were “irrational”, “illogical”, and “tantamount to blasphemy”.
The court, presided over by Justice Saugata Bhattacharyya, in a verbal order, said the controversy was an avoidable one and wondered if it was sensible to name animals in a zoo after historical, mythological, or religious and political figures. It suggested that the state’s zoo authority consider renaming the animals.
Akbar, seven years and eight months old, is currently not in the same enclosure as Sita, aged five years and six months. If all goes as per the zoo officials’ plan, they will be displayed together after two months. They have been allotted 20 hectares in the 297-hectare zoo.
Meanwhile, the controversy has resulted in the government of Tripura suspending the state’s principal chief conservator of forests (wildlife and ecotourism), Prabin Lal Agrawal, though it is not clear whether he was the one who committed the offence of naming the pair.
