The dancing bears of India are one of the saddest sights you can see. These magnificent creatures are stolen from the wild at a few weeks old by killing the mother who will fight to the death to defend their young.
The young bewildered cubs are then bundled into sacks and driven for days to the markets where they are then sold into a lifetime of slavery. If they survive this ordeal they have worse to come as they are pinned to the ground whilst a red hot iron is pushed through the top part of the nose into the nasal cavity. Through this terrible wound a rope is then threaded down and out the opening of the nose. It is via this instrument of torture that the bear quickly learns to stand on its back legs to try and relieve the pain as the rope is pulled up above its head. Any sign of aggression is quickly and mercilessly beaten out of the terrified creature. As it grows it will often have its lower jaw broken to ensure it cannot bite and its claws may well be pulled out. It is through all this suffering that these animals are then made to perform for the ignorant tourists who think it is all just a bit of fun!
Thankfully the champion of animal welfare in India, Maneka Gandhi, who is a very influential government minister, has now managed to make this practice illegal. However, at present there are no facilities to take these bears and they can still be seen performing all over India. We have been working with animal welfare groups in India to try and resolve this problem but the costs are so huge and at present our financial demands are so great that we cannot afford to get financially involved, although we would dearly like to.
If you would like to help us to relieve the suffering of these bears please Donate to our fighting fund and become an IAR supporter.