Turtles, dead birds found in animal rescuer’s farm

Rajkot: A self-proclaimed animal welfare activist in Rajkot was arrested after the forest department found large number of dead birds, tortoises and nil gais were kept illegally in his farm house in Kalipat village, 16 km from Rajkot city.
The accused Divyaraj Shah was carrying out these activities under the garb of Jeev Daya (compassion towards living creatures), officials of the forest department alleged.

Deputy Conservator of Forest (DCF), Rajkot social forestry division, M M Muni told TOI: “The wildlife crime control bureau had received a complaint about him keeping animals and birds in his farm. We conducted a raid on Wednesday evening and found 25 star turtles, which is protected under schedule-3 of Wildlife Act, three nil gais and dead birds and squirrels from the refrigerator in the farmhouse.”

However, the forest department team had to leave without taking any action, after Divyaraj’s relatives created a ruckus. The search operation resumed on Thursday morning with the help of security personnel and continued till evening.

According to sources, some of the dead birds found were owl and cuckoos.

Accused Divyaraj claimed that he was running a wildlife trust for animal welfare, but could not produce the registration details of the trust when asked for by the forest department team. He was arrested after an offence under section 39(3) of Wildlife Protection Act was lodged against him. He was released on bail after payment of Rs 25,000 as advance recovery.

Muni said, “We are investigating if he was selling the star turtles and to whom. As per Feng Shui, star turtle are believed to bring prosperity if kept inside the house. However, we are still probing why he had kept so many birds in the farmhouse.” Officials don’t rule out a bigger racket of wildlife trafficking.

In a statement given to the forest department, Divyaraj claimed that the nil gais were kept as part of animal welfare and to protect them. According to officials, all the animals and birds have sent been sent to Sakkarbaug Zoo and the carcasses for postmortem.

Divyaraj was running an NGO for conservation and rehabilitation of wild animals and claiming to be a wildlife rescuer himself.

Bhavin Patel, who informed the forest department about this racket, said, “As per my knowledge, he was selling ratite birds, which are in huge demand in Punjab and some foreign countries. Though he claims of treating injured birds, he is actually selling them. He kept a few dead birds in the refrigerator only to show that these had died during treatment.”

Bhavin also claimed that Divyaraj had posted some pictures and videos of treating birds like flamingo on some social media and YouTube, but deleted them after the forest department raid.