Gujarat: Gandhidham cats get recreational park

RAJKOT: Nobody actually knows how smack in the middle of Lima, Peru, the world’s biggest park for cats, the Kennedy Park came into existence in downtown Miraflores three decades ago. But back home in port town Gandhidham, Upendra Goswami’s garden of cats, spread across 500 square yards, has its own history to meow about.
The custom house agent has been running his feline garden in Gandhidham with 200 cats since 2017 but it has roots in Goswami’s firm belief that his elder sister Meena, who died at the age of 18 in late 1990s and loved cats, had come back to the family.

A cat came to his house in 2015 and its activities convinced him and the entire family that it was his sister who had come back to them. In order to maintain the cat lineage, he started the garden to help the felines thrive.

“I started feeling that my dead sister came back to my home as a cat and when I started to believe the cat which did not allow to touch anybody came and sat in my lap,” Goswami told TOI.

Pooh-poohing beliefs, he said: “I was peon in the firm in which I am currently a business partner. The happiness and growth they brought into our lives is unimaginable.”

At the garden, it’s all about one big cat family — some sitting on cottages, others watching cartoons (mouse) in a mini theatre, while some more busy in cat business — sans human or dog interference. The cat family grew with time and in three years there were around 125 cats playing in Goswami’s house.
So, in 2017, Goswami brought a plot in Gandhidham near his house to create a cat garden to accommodate the huge family. While his cat is a 200-member clan, there are a total 600 cats residing in the park premises for the past three years. Some have even died.

Goswami also owns 28 Persian cats and one of them had reached Mundra port by mistake in a container from Dubai. It survived without food for 15 days before the custom officials contacted Goswami. He named the white cat, Mahalakshmi and also found her male partner from a family of Adipur. Eventually, Mahalakshmi died and her daughter gave birth to a cat two days ago, which was spitting images of her mum. Goswamis have named it Akhand Mahalakashmi.
Goswami and his wife Pooja look after their 200 cats every day. A principal in a school, Pooja said “I have to get up at 5am in the morning to feed the cats and also after I return home at 1.30pm. We take care of their food, their health and everything.”
For all their medical needs, the cats, most of which are street cats, are even taken to Ahmedabad to consult specialists. The family opens the special garden for visitors for four hours on Sunday only for a nominal fee. “I spend Rs 1.5 lakh every month and 90 percent of that money is from my pocket,” Goswami added.