Horrors of the wild bird trade. Image Michael & Lauren CriglerPATNA: People are often caught in red tape. On Monday, it was the turn of parrots, many of whom died due to hunger and thirst as policemen took their own time in releasing a seized cage full of them to forest officials.

It so happened that one Aamir Ahmed was taking around 115 parrots to Kolkata by the Danapur-Howrah Express train on Sunday evening. A journalist, who happened to be at the Patna railway station, stumbled upon the cloth-wrapped cage and, out of sheer curiosity, unwrapped it.

He informed the Government Railway Police (GRP) officials who got the cage unloaded from the train's parcel van but only after being enlightened about the wildlife Act. Ahmed was also brought to the GRP police station at platform number 1. Patna divisional forest officer A K Prasad came to know about the incident on Monday morning, and sent forester Arun Kumar to the railway station to ensure the release of the birds.

However, Kumar, who reached the station around 11 am, was made to wait till 4 pm by the GRP officials.
"I repeatedly told the GRP officials that the condition of the caged birds must be deteriorating but they were more interested in sending the smuggler to judicial custody than handing over the birds to me," Kumar told TOI.

Ten of the birds had died by the time the forester was handed over the possession of the cage. A desperate Kumar released the remaining birds but 20-odd of them could not fly and fell in and around the station premises. Curious onlookers scrambled against each other to lift them, to be caged again.

"The birds had become too weak to fly after remaining without any feed for so long," Kumar rued.

Patna's SP (railway) D N Gupta pleaded ignorance about the incident. "I will look into it and take action against the guilty for the delay in handing over the birds to the forester," he said.

Parrots are Schedule III birds, and law prohibits the hunting and trading of such birds. Such birds cannot be kept in captivity. According to the law, such birds, if seized, should be sent either to a rehabilitation centre or to the nearest zoo.