Endangered Indus river dolphin shot dead in Balochistan

SUKKUR: In an unfortunate incident, a group of unidentified men in Balochistan shot a rare Indus river dolphin dead.

A Sindh Wildlife Department spokesperson confirmed the tragic incident. He said that the dolphin, locally called the bhulan, strayed into the Gannang Regulator in Balochistan, from Sukkur via the Kirthar Canal of the Indus River.

He said that the irrigation department had informed the wildlife department about the dead dolphin.

Could this be the heaviest animal to ever exist?

Zulfikar Ali Bhutto, the grandson and namesake of the Pakistan Peoples Party founder, posted a video on Instagram mourning the event. Bhutto, who is an animal rights activist, said he was heartbroken to see an innocent mammal lose its life.

His video caption said, “I’m in grief and I pray for a kinder society.”

In the video, Bhutto requested those involved in the killing to abstain from such hunting practices.

“If a bhulan is murdered, it means you have murdered a part of Sindh,” he said. He referred to a dolphin hunting ban, which was instated by his grandfather to protect the endangered species.

“These things [dolphins] are very special and we can’t lose them,” he added.

Over the years, the number of dolphins found in the Indus, its natural habitat, has significantly shrunk. This is due to the construction of reservoirs, dams, and barrages for agricultural purposes.

Unidentified individuals poison 10 horses to death in Gujrat

It is one of the only four freshwater dolphin species in the world facing severe environmental threats. These include unsustainable fishing, entanglement incidents, canal stranding and release of untreated industrial effluents into the river.

The International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN) lists the blind dolphin as ‘endangered’ on their Red List of Threatened Species. It is the second most endangered cetacean in the world. An estimated 1,800 individuals remain alive, as of 2017.