Pigeon thieves fly the coop

A rash of racing pigeon thefts across the city have left many breeders high and dry. Having lost their expensive birds to theft, many say that police seldom pay attention to their ‘pigeon theft’ complaints.

For years now breeding of exotic birds has been lucrative business for professional breeders. However, of late, protecting these birds from thieves has become a difficult task.

Many instances over the last few weeks had shown that there was very little help from police in rescuing the birds, breeders said. According to them, police authorities have their hands full with law and order cases and seldom show any interest in recovering the stolen birds.

R.T. Venkatesh, a resident of Marai Malai Nagar, has been a bird enthusiast and a breeder for several years. Recently, he had been shocked to find over 20 of his pigeons — many of which were prized one — missing. He said that although the police took his complaint, he was unable to get much help from them as they had other ‘pressing’ matters to attend to.

R. Murugan, another pigeon breeder residing in Perungalathur, had a similar experience. Over 100 of his racing pigeons had been stolen and when he had approached the police, they had asked him for photos of his pigeons and also sought information about persons he had his suspicions on.

M. Karunanidhi, a retired Superintendent of Police, said such kind of thefts would be registered under cattle and poultry theft. But cases where the stolen birds were in large numbers, it is considered a serious crime.

He said even if the police were able to apprehend the thieves the victim’s task of proving that the robbed birds belonged to him/her is onerous.