Six-feet-long crocodile captured from Lucknow home

LUCKNOW: After a night long effort, a six-feet long young female fresh water crocodile was captured from the premises of a residence in Gudamba, early Friday morning. The Muggar crocodile was first spotted inside the house at around 12:30 am in the intervening night of Thursday and Friday and was caught after a relentless operation that lasted till 7 am on Friday.
Captured by the combined efforts of the team from forest department and the Turtle Survival Alliance (TSA) India Rescue team, the crocodile was transferred to the Kukrail Gharial and Turtle Rehabilitation Center. The crocodile will be kept under quarantine to ascertain if any injuries have been sustained after which it will be released in the wild.

As per TSA's Arunima Sinha who was part of the team, "It was around 12:30 am that I received the call informing about the crocodile being spotted. It had escaped from the nearby pond due to the rising water level in the pond under heavy rainfall. The team was then quickly assembled and we rushed to the spot."

The first attempt to catch the crocodile was made at around 2 am after which the female crocodile slipped inside the flooded areas nearby, making the rescue operation difficult. "We slowly confined it towards the boundary wall of the house, threw net over it, covered its eyes and tied its limbs. The veterinarian then thoroughly examined the crocodile confirming that there was no injuries on the female and that it was in good health."

Apart from Arunima, the team from TSA included Dr Ashish Singh, Balram Singh Rajput and that from forest department included Range officer Chotelal Gupta and forest guards Ram Dhiraj and Raees.