Delhi zoo director transferred hours after man rescued from lion's enclosure

The Union Environment Ministry transferred Delhi Zoo Director Renu Singh, hours after she lead a successful operation to rescue a mentally-unstable man who leapt into the enclosure of a lion at the zoo.

Singh, a 1997-batch IFS officer of the Uttar Pradesh cadre, has been shifted to the ministry as Deputy Inspector General of Forests.

She was appointed as the first female director of the Delhi zoo on March 2, 2017.

Suneesh Buxy, a 1998-batch IFS officer from the AGMUT cadre, has been given the additional charge of the Delhi zoo director "till a regular incumbent is appointed".

"It has been decided with the approval of competent authority that Renu Singh, Director, National Zoological Park, New Delhi, will be laterally shifted in the Ministry of Environment, Forests and Climate Change as Deputy Inspector General of Forests," read an official order dated October 17.

"The element of DIGF post, which had been upgraded to the level of Inspector General of Forests (IGF) and shifted from Department of Land Resources, Ministry of Rural Development, to MoEFF&CC vide notification... dated June 21, 2019, is downgraded to DIGF level for posting of Singh," it said.

The transfer orders came on a day when she supervised a successful operation to rescue a mentally-unstable man who jumped into the enclosure of a lion at the Delhi zoo.

Unlike the 2014 incident when a white tiger mauled a man to death after he had jumped inside its enclosure in the zoo, this time the zoo staff acted swiftly and followed a standard operating procedure prepared for such emergency situations.

India's oldest chimpanzee, 59-year-old chimpanzee Rita, died in the zoo on October 1. The zoo also lost an eight-year-old Royal Bengal tiger, Rama, recently due to multiple organ failure.