Mock funeral held for turtles in Orissa - Greenpeace activists detained

The Delhi Police have arrested 13 Greenpeace activists for protesting outside Orissa Chief Minister Naveen Patnaik's house.

The activists are protesting the deaths of olive ridley turtles.

Greenpeace activists who have been monitoring a turtle camp in Orissa this entire mass-nesting season have counted over 3000 dead Olive Ridley turtles outside the sanctuary area.

Despite repeated attempts to get the Orissa government to provide the endangered species with better protection, no action was taken.

Greenpeace then decided to bring the issue to Delhi. Earlier in the day, they held a mock funeral for the turtles outside Patnaik's house.

The turtle carcasses were garlanded and placed on a white cloth.

The activists are hoping to provoke the Orissa government to respond and provide better protection for the turtles.

http://www.ndtv.com/environment/wildlife.asp?id=86881&callid=1

Here's an update to this story

While I have never had any real affection for Greenpeace or other activists that share similar methods I do tend to side with them on this matter. It's terrible that 3000 Ridley's were killed in this one area and what I find most disgusting is the Indian government apparently isn't interested in doing anything about that, but they are very quick to arrest people for using the carcasses of those turtles to protest their deaths.
As a side note, their bail of 20,000R as of today equals $444.05 US dollars.


Three turtle crusaders booked under Wildlife Act
NEW DELHI, APR 17 (PTI)

A bid to sound the alarm on the unprecedented deaths of the endangered Olive Ridley Turtles in Orissa coasts recently landed three Greenpeace activists in trouble when the police seized the carcasses of three turtles from them during a demonstration here.

The three accused, members of the global environmental watchdog Greenpeace, were arrested while demonstrating outside the official residence of Orissa CM Naveen Patnaik.

The trio - Imran, Ashish Fernandes and Bidham Chander Singh - had reportedly displayed outside Patnaik's Aurangazeb Road residence the turtle remains, which they brought from Orissa, to drive their point home.

Ironically, all three, identified as animal activists and research scholars for Greenpeace, were booked under the Wildlife Act, 1972 for possessing the turtle remains and produced in a sessions court.

Arguing for bail the activists said that they were forced to protest outside the CM's Delhi residence after the Orissa government and Forest Department had failed to take any action despite repeated efforts from their side.

Granting bail to the accused on a personal bond of Rs 20,000 each, Additional Chief Metropolitan Magistrate Sanjeev Jain observed that "the ways and means of protest should not be beyond the scope of legally permissible means".

"At least one lakh Ridley turtles had died on the beaches of Orissa in the past 10 years. What have they done to repair the damage? All we did was to question them about it," said Sanjeev Gopal, a Greenpeace member.

Meanwhile, the same court today sent Najafgarh resident Om Wati, found in possession of 89 Indian Soft Shelled turtles, to judicial custody till May 5.

http://www.outlookindia.com/pti_news.asp?id=378542