When humans fret about lions' names
North Bengal Wild Animals Park, a.k.a. Bengal Safari Park, in Siliguri, West Bengal.
The usual suspects — two organisations, who wear 'Hindu' pride on their sleeves lest it isn't visible — staged demonstrations, upset that the wildlife park authorities had apparently named the lion and its partner, Akbar and Sita, respectively. Like all astute, complying humans, the authorities have denied this christening (sic) to avoid charges of facilitating a possible 'love jihad' among the Panthera leo species.
The 7-year-old lion and 5-year-old lioness, brought to the safari park on Monday from Tripura's Sepahijala Wildlife Sanctuary and Zoo, reportedly came to their new home already monikered.
The pair doesn't seem to care much about the names given to them by humans in Tripura and retained in Bengal. For all they care, they probably would be fine being named Fred and Ginger.
But humans being a nomenclatural species must be amusing to the lion couple. The two officially de-named non-human animals can, after all, see only a rather hairless biped species in humans, not subcategories made along strange, human-concocted mystical lines.
