Covid-19: All the world’s now a zoo, only this time with animals on outside & humans on inside

There is, indeed, a sudden reversal of roles of animals vis-à-vis humans.

By ET Bureau | Apr 08, 2020, 08.05 AM IST

Viral posts of ‘nature hitting the reset button’ — such as dolphins and swans reappearing in Venetian canals and drunken elephants falling asleep in a deserted tea garden in China — have been pronounced as fakes by wildlife experts.

One of the early humorous observations about the current quarantining of humans worldwide — albeit in varying degrees — came in the form of a cartoon of two Indian stray dogs wondering about the suddenly depopulated city streets. “They (humans) must have been rounded up and taken away by the corporation,” says the canine wag. Due to Covid-19, there is, indeed, a sudden reversal of roles of animals vis-à-vis humans when it comes to who’s in and who’s out, so to speak.

While viral posts of ‘nature hitting the reset button’ — such as dolphins and swans reappearing in Venetian canals and drunken elephants falling asleep in a deserted tea garden in China — have been pronounced as fakes by wildlife experts, the Earth’s fauna can be forgiven for thinking that all the world’s now a zoo, with apologies to Shakespeare, only this time with animals on the outside.

In India, where once only the lions of Gir had the chutzpah to roam urban streets in India, now sambar deer have been spotted on Chandigarh’s roads, chital in Dehradun city and nilgai in Noida. And, most importantly, a critically endangered Malabar large-spotted civet was photographed in deserted Kozhikode, appropriately, near a zebra crossing. And the talk in many a wildlife congregation these days must be that humans are finally getting an insider’s perspective of life in a zoo.

From Olympics To Football & Cricket: Sports 2020 Stands Cancelled

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The summer of sport is in jeopardy. As the coronavirus pandemic spreads across the globe, organisers are cutting their losses and either cancelling or postponing marquee sporting events till the public health crisis abates.

The Tokyo Olympics have been postponed.

Here’s a roundup of all the major sporting events that have been upended by coronavirus.