UN INT Intro Text w/ Responsive Image - *Important Note* You must UNLINK this shared library component before making page-specific customizations.
As the Animal Welfare Board of India's inspection reveals, animals used in Indian circuses are subjected to chronic confinement, physical abuse, and psychological torment. Whips, bullhooks—weapons resembling a fireplace poker with a sharp hook on one end—and other devices are used to inflict pain on the animals and beat them into submission. They perform frightening, confusing tricks, such as jumping through rings of fire, not because they want to but out of fear of violent punishment.
Even when they aren't performing, animals used in circuses endure a lifetime of misery. Their access to water, food, and veterinary care is often severely restricted. Dogs may be crammed into wire crates and rarely let out. Birds are often confined to tiny, filthy cages, and their wings may be crudely clipped so that they can't fly. Horses are typically kept tethered on short ropes, and elephants are often kept shackled.
Dogs forced to live on iron mesh at Moonlight Circus.
Bolivia, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Cyprus, and Greece have outlawed the use of all animals in circuses, but so far, the Indian government has banned only the use of bears, monkeys, tigers, panthers, and lions. Let officials in the country know that other species are suffering, too.
What You Can Do
Please add your voice to PETA's by letting Indian officials know that all animals who are exhibited or forced to perform in circuses are suffering.