A 16-year-old male horse, Baba, drowned in Thane’s Masunda lake on Wednesday morning after it tripped on its bridle, which slipped off its head, while being taken for a bath.
Naupada police said that Yusuf Shaikh, 25, had bought the horse at a horse fair in Kalyan on Tuesday evening and the accident took place at 11 a.m. on Wednesday when he took Baba and two other horses to the lake for a bath.
Police Inspector S.N. Dhumal said, “The lake was hardly three-foot deep, but the horse wasn’t able to pick itself up. Mr. Shaikh could not single-handedly pull Baba out of the lake. By the time fellow tongawalas came to the rescue, Baba had fallen unconscious.”
Baba was rushed to Dr. S. Shirodkar’s veterinary clinic, where it was declared dead before admission. Dr. Shirodkar said, “The horse died due to accumulation of water in the lungs. The nostrils and lungs were full of water when he was brought here.”
The police said that Mr. Shaikh was a professional horse-cart operator at Talaopalli in Thane and stayed in Naupada.
Baba’s body was handed over to Naupada police, who sent the body to Bhiwandi government hospital for a post-mortem.
