The Animal Ark is a special wild animal sanctuary, in Maharashtra, India, that takes in orphaned animals whose parents get hunted by villagers for food. It was set up by a local doctor who understood the necessity of hunting, but couldn’t bare to let the young animals starve to death.
One day, during the early 70s, Dr. Prakash Amte and his wife were taking a walk in the Dandarayana forest of Gadchiroli, when they encountered a group of tribal people carrying a dead monkey that they had hunted. They noticed that there was a baby monkey clinging to its dead mother’s body and trying to suckle her breast. It was heartbreaking sight, and Dr. Prakash decided he couldn’t let the hunters kill the baby as well. He asked them what they intended to do with it, and they said they were going to eat it, just like its mother. He knew the tribe killed out of necessity, not for sport, so he offered them rice and clothing in exchange for the baby monkey. They reluctantly accepted, and the small animal became the first member of their big animal family.
