Stray Dogs Kill 31 Endangered Blackbucks in India

The sheer negligence of the Kanpur Zoo authorities led to a shocking incident where 31 endangered blackbucks were killed by a pack of stray dogs at a zoological park in Kanpur, India.

The Chief Minister of Uttar Pradesh Akhilesh Yadav suspended the zoo director K Praveen Rao along with six other employees. The state government has set up a serious inquiry into the matter.

This situation was discovered on Sunday morning, when authorities noticed the scattered bodies of the blackbucks, with the dogs still feeding on a few on them. The forest guards immediately killed the dogs.

According to the zoo officials, the dogs may have entered through a gap in the boundary wall which was already broken. And the blackbuck's enclosure was closest to that wall, reports BBC.

"The wall had fallen down and was being repaired. But it appears it hadn't been fixed properly," chief wildlife officer Rupak De told BBC.

Prior to this, seven employees from the zoo were suspended and the director served notice, after 13 deer and a stag were found dead in 2009.

A team from the Conservator of Forests in Lucknow will conduct the investigation.

The carcasses of the blackbucks were sent for analysis. The report states that 18 of them died out of shock and 29 of them had teeth and claw marks on their bodies.

This incident has been taken seriously, as blackbucks are an endangered species in India and are being protected by the Wildlife Protection Act of 1972. They are an antelope species native to the Indian subcontinent. It is the only living specie of the antelope, often known as the Indian antelope.