Bird activists demand ban on manjha

New Delhi: Animal and bird activists on Monday demanded a ban on manjha - kite string made using broken-glass adhesive - arguing it led to the death of 15 birds here as people flew kites on the Independence Day.

"The manjha is manufactured after pasting broken glass over the thread. It is very lethal and fatally injures birds when they came in contact with it in the sky," Ambika Shukla, an activist and an trustee of People For Animal, told IANS. "We demand the government to ban its import and manufacturing," she said. At least 15 birds, mostly pigeons, were killed and over 300 injured due to kite strings on the Independence Day Friday in Delhi. An official with a bird hospital in central Delhi said over 300 birds were admitted out of which 15 died during treatment and a few were critical. Earlier, normal thread was used for kite flying, Shukla said. But now many people bet over kite flying on the day and hence use sharp threads to entangle their opponents` kites. Shukla said people use sharp thread which are imported from foreign countries and these should be banned. "The death of birds are very painful because the birds are one of the beautiful creation of the nature," another activist and bird lover Subhash Joshi said. "In vast urban landscapes like Delhi, birds help us connect with nature.... due to rapid urbanization, birds and animal species are vanishing from the urban environment...," Joshi added. Besides injuring birds, the sharp threads also at times injures motorcycle riders. A college student recalled how one her friends averted an accident due to kite strings. "One of my friends nearly escaped falling from the motorcycle after the string of a kite entangled his helmet. Their should be identified zones in every locality for the people to fly kites," said Himani Sharma, a college student.