KARACHI: Hovering between life and death for the past nine days, elephant Noor Jehan had fallen in a pond in her enclosure on the night between April 12 and 13 and suffered injuries after she was left unattended in violation of the instructions of her vets, it emerged on Friday.

Sources told Dawn that Four Paws’ experts supervising her treatment since early this month had cautioned that Noor Jehan was an intensive-care patient, requiring 24-hour monitoring.

They said that zoo keepers had earlier chained the animal at night but the Four Paws experts had advised against this and asking them to keep the ailing elephant under observation round the clock.

The sources said the zoo staff members allegedly gave misleading information to the experts that the ailing elephant had ventured in the pond herself.

“She was already in the pond when the staff reached her enclosure between 7am and 8am on April 13. She might have fallen at night. Nobody knows,” shared an official on the condition of anonymity.

Four Paws vets had recommended 24-hour monitoring of elephant, officials say

The official added that the water level in the pond had been low that led to injuries.

The 17-year-old African elephant couldn’t pull herself out due to her weak hind legs badly affected by the illness she had been suffering from for months.

“She seemed to be completely exhausted and collapsed as soon as she was on the ground. Her skin was bruised in several places,” he said, adding that she remained there for prolonged hours before being pulled out with the help of a crane.

The rescue operation was carried out after a delay of at least 10 to 12 hours and that no ultrasound was carried out to detect internal injuries, he added.

Earlier this month, the Four Paws’ team had arrived at the Karachi zoo following an SOS from zoo officials after they failed to diagnose and treat Noor Jehan, who suffered for months and became so ill that she was unable to move.

Her condition improved after getting treatment from the foreign experts who detected a large haematoma in her abdomen and found the perineal membrane ruptured.

The experts had cautioned that Noor Jehan was an intensive-care patient, requiring 24-hour monitoring along with medication and physical therapy.

Within four days of the team’s departure, however, the elephant reportedly fell in the pond.

Some sources claimed that it was the second time that Noor Jehan had fallen in the pond. The first incident, they said, happened last year following her tusk operation in August.

“She might have fallen due to the slippery slope as the pond was hardly cleaned in those days. It’s likely that the pond wasn’t fully filled and she suffered injuries causing a large haematoma (a solid swelling of clotted blood often caused by an injury) in her abdomen and rupturing her perineal membrane, which were later detected by Four Paws early this month,” an official said.

He rejected the assessment of the experts that the haematoma seemed to have been caused by a fight between the two zoo elephants.

“They love each other so much. It’s unthinkable that they had a fight,” he said.

Sources questioned why the zoo staff did not block the pond’s entrance, knowing well about Noor Jehan’s physical trauma which she had been suffering from for months that had rendered her hind legs partially paralysed.

It is important to mention here that the Karachi Metropolitan Corporation (KMC) running the zoo hasn’t instituted any inquiry into Noor Jehan’s prolonged illness and the reported fall, both of which happened due to zoo staff’s persistent neglect.

Published in Dawn, April 22nd, 2023