Pigeon collared as a possible Chinese spy freed after 8 months
NEW DELHI >> Suspicion of foreign espionage, cursive messages in ancient Chinese, a sensitive microchip — and a suspect that could not be stopped at the border.
Ravindra Patil, the assistant Mumbai, India, police sub-inspector assigned to the case, was scratching his head for answers. But first, he had to find a place to lock up the unusual captive.
So he turned to a veterinary hospital in the Indian metropolis, asking it to retrieve a list of “very confidential and necessary” information about the suspect — a black pigeon caught lurking at a port where international vessels dock.
“The police never came to check the pigeon,” said Dr. Mayur Dangar, the manager of the hospital.
After eight months, the bird was finally set free last week, its innocence of spying for China long confirmed through crack detective work, but the jail doors flung open only after a newspaper report, repeated letters to the police by the veterinary hospital, and intervention from an animal rights group.
The group, PETA India, celebrated what it called the end of a “wrongful imprisonment.”
It is not the first time that India has feared feathered infiltration.
In 2014, authorities in the Himalayan region of Kashmir arrested a pigeon near the border on similar charges.
The bird in Mumbai suggested new twists — it had appeared in a city nowhere near a contested border, and the Chinese writing inked on its wings pointed to a more sophisticated and powerful rival that India has been grappling with in recent years.
Patil, the 39-year-old sub-inspector, had dealt with two animal cases before in his 12-year career: the death of two dogs, one in a suspected poisoning that required a post-mortem, and the other in a road accident. Neither case had geopolitical ramifications.
This time, however, “I had to ask advice from our intelligence colleagues,” he said in a phone interview.
The bird had been spotted by guards with the Central Industrial Security Force, which watches over government facilities including ports. Not the first to cast a critical eye on a pigeon, the duty officer saw this one loitering alone — “it was just sitting there, and it all looked suspicious to them — chip, and ring on the feet,” Patil said. The guards informed the police.
Once Patil found a place to lock up the bird, the slow work of investigation began. And he started piecing together clues.
The rings on the bird's legs, including one that had a chip, were sent to the forensic sciences lab.
“The chip had details of the location coding — what it is, where it has come from,” he said.
“Nothing else turned out suspicious,” he added.