The city will have to do without the V.O.C. Park Zoo as the Coimbatore Corporation will soon close it down. The Corporation’s decision to close down the zoo with around 530 animals, birds and reptiles follows it losing an appeal with the Central Zoo Authority and the Ministry of Environment, Forest and Climate Change, say sources.
In the process, the Corporation will also lose the status of being one among the very few urban local bodies that runs a zoo.
The sources say the Corporation will soon get in touch with the Forest Department that may look at managing the Zoo until shifting the animals to other zoos.
The Corporation losing the appeal comes at the end of a long drawn out battle that began nearly four years ago. The Central Zoo Authority, after refusing to renew the Corporation’s application to run the Zoo citing lack of necessary space and amenities for the animals and visitors, asked it to take a series of steps.
It also asked the Corporation to do away with the toy train and other recreational facilities that it had installed within the zoo premises.
After complying with a few of the Authority’s orders, the Corporation explored various options to retain the zoo like looking for alternative places, expanding the zoo area by annexing the nearby V.O.C. Park, redesigning the zoo or transporting some of the animals.
It had also engaged consultants and experts recommended by the Forest Department to redesign the zoo. As the steps it took did not fructify, the Corporation, sources say, explored the possibility of shifting the zoo to the land it held near the Coimbatore Central Prison complex.
It had planned to utilise the funds available under the Smart Cities Mission to not only shift the zoo but also develop it into a bigger zoo. As it kept sending proposals to various authorities, the State Government’s decision to utilise the land near the prison for the Semmozhi Poonga put a lid on all of the Corporation’s plans, the sources recall and say the civic body has very little avenues ahead to retain the zoo in the city.