A Telugu pandit with a penchant for adopting stray cats began an indefinite fast here on Friday demanding security for her and felines.
It is unfortunate that the society at large remains indifferent to the plight of the hapless creatures, laments the woman who has pitched a tent in front of the Prakasam Bhavan urging the revenue and police authorities to ensure security for her and felines which go missing at periodic intervals.
She had been encountering problems from the local people who wanted her to give up her passion for felines. Her neighbours consider cats as intruders which snatch away their quota of milk.
Ms. Santha Kumari, a teacher in the Zilla Parishad High School, says she had been on the unending job of rescuing feral cats and providing them a safe heaven.
She proudly says “I spend more than Rs. 15,000 per month to buy them milk.”
“Yet I am not able to feed them to their full satisfaction. I am planning to start a cattle farm myself to ensure enough supply of milk to my pets,” reveals the fan of felines.
Santha Kumari, who teaches Telugu in the Zilla Parishad High School in Pernamita from 2009, noticed that a large number of cats which lived in wilderness and survived by eating rats that hid in the paddy fields on the city outskirts, starved to death with the ever-expanding city turning into a concrete jungle.
The cats and kittens find themselves out of place losing their natural habitat. This prompted Santha Kumari to start a rescue home for the uncared cats.
“Those against my passion for fostering felines are responsible for my pets getting killed,” she complains and wants the police to come to her rescue. Busy with routine crimes, her earlier pleas to police had fallen on deaf ears, she complained.
She had tried in vain to draw the attention of the revenue officials, who, also amid plethora of complaints, had not given the attention to the pressing problem of the felines.
She observes it is very much part and parcel of the Indian culture to take care of animals, both wild and domesticated.
“We offer milk even to poisonous snakes but not showing enough compassion to hapless cats and kittens. In other societies too cat is worshipped and considered as bestower of fortune,” she adds.
Those against my passion for fostering felines are responsible for my pets getting killed
Telugu Pandit Santha Kumari has been facing flak from local people, who want her to give up her passion for felines
