A nine year-old female chimpanzee, Suchi, escaped from its enclosure in the Nehru Zoological Park and spent the next couple of hours roaming the premises on Wednesday morning.
The workers who noticed the chimpanzee followed it and with the aid of veterinary staff gave mild sedation and shifted it back to the enclosure. Three zoo workers received minor injures in the process.
According to the zoo curator, A.Sankaran, the chimpanzee managed to open the door of its night house, which was not locked at the time, and came out. "It happened in the morning around the time visitors started trooping in. We alerted them and held visitors back till the chimpanzee was returned to its enclosure," he said.
Two of the staff working in the food court and a gardener received minor scratches while chasing the chimpanzee. They were sent to the hospital for vaccination.