News
500th bear rescued!
December 23, 2008, 2:35AM MT
By Sharon St. Joan
Wildlife SOS welcomes their 500th rescued bear
Wildlife SOS welcomes their 500th rescued bear
By Sharon St. Joan, Best Friends Network Writer
In the past six years, Kartick Satyanarayan and Geeta Seshamani of Wildlife SOS in Delhi, India, have accomplished an amazing feat--rescuing five hundred bears who had been condemned to a life of dancing for tourists.
In doing this, they are coming close to bringing to an end this abusive situation for the wild bears of India.
The name of bear number 500 is Chitra, and she was brought into the Bear Rescue Center on December 19, 2008. The Kalandars in India are a group who have traditionally made their living by capturing wild bears as cubs, then training them to become "dancing bears." They are then used on the streets in order to beg for money from tourists.
The lives of the bears are very difficult for several reasons--long hours spent on hard pavement in the hot Indian sun; plus, the training and the means of restraining the bears and forcing them to perform their "dancing" are physically cruel and painful, often causing infections to the bear's face.
Chitra was brought to the rescue center by her Kalandar master. The rehabilitation of the Kalandars goes along with the rehabilitation of the bears. This is necessary. Otherwise, the Kalandar, who has no other way of making a living, might simply acquire another wild bear and start the same process all over again. Kalandars, when relinquishing their bears, enter into an extended program in which they are mentored by social workers . They are given the skills to earn a living with another trade and are helped financially so that they can make a new start in life, in exchange for giving up their bear and promising never to acquire another bear. This means freedom from a harsh lifestyle for both the bears and the Kalandars.
This is a model program, developed by Wildlife SOS, which has been extraordinarily successful--and which is based on the principal of kindness to both animals and humans. When very poor people are dependent for their livelihood on animals, then providing them with an alternate way to make a living is good for both the people and the animals. The bears, who cannot be released back to the wild, live permanently in sanctuaries where they have freedom to run, play, and be bears again.
Chitra is twelve years old, though she is very thin, weighing only 62 kilos (136 pounds). She cowered, still frightened, when she arrived. Geeta Seshamani, Co-Founder of Wildlife SOS, explained that her nose ring and ropes were surgically removed. After that, she began to relax. Her feet are in bad shape too, but now she'll have her own den to rest in that overlooks a quiet garden, as she begins to recover from her years of such a hard life.
Dr. Arun, the Wildlife SOS vet, expressed confidence that Citra will soon get used to a healthy diet consisting of honey, milk, porridge, and delicious fruit, and her health problems will be overcome.
Kartick Satyanarayan, Co-founder of Wildlife SOS, thanked Wildlife SOS's supporters and international partners for making possible the rescue of Chitra and said that it would be better still if there were no need to rescue the bears at all--if they could simply live free in the wild.
Each bear rescued costs Wildlife SOS around $2,000. Help with donations is always gratefully received, and means that more bears like Chitra can be given a new life.
Congratulations to Wildlife SOS for doing a magnificent job rescuing 500 bears!
What you can do
To read more about Chitra's story on the Wildlife SOS website, please go to (Caution: you may find the photos and descriptions disturbing.)
http://www.wildlifesos.org/News/Dancing%20Bear%20“CHITRA/Chitra.html
Top photo: © Courtenay Lanier / Dreamstime.com / This is not Chitra, but is another Sloth Bear.
Second photo: © Denise Kappa | Dreamstime.com / Another Sloth Bear