Animal rights organisations have raised issues soon after videos of a Pakistani couple utilizing a sedated lion cub as a prop through their wedding emerged on the internet. The pictures had been posted on the Instagram story of Studio Afzl – a Lahore-based photography studio, reports Geo Television.
In the footage, which has sparked a substantial backlash on social media, the couple can be observed holding hands even though the lion cub lies involving them. The videos had been accompanied by the hashtag #SherdiRani to emphasise on the presence of the cub.
Save the Wild, an animal welfare organisation in Pakistan, shared the footage on Twitter, highlighting the incident as a case of animal cruelty and requesting that the lion cub be rescued from the studio.
@PunjabWildlife does your permit let for a lion cub to be rented out for ceremonies?Look at this poor cub sedated and becoming made use of as a prop.This studio is in Lahore exactly where this cub is becoming kept.Rescue him please pic.twitter.com/fMcqZnoRMd
— save the wild (@wildpakistan) March 7, 2021
On Twitter, footage of the lion cub becoming made use of as a wedding prop drew substantial backlash.
“Well this is shameful. No point sedating a young animal,” wrote one individual in the comments section.
“This is horrible. Sedating a lion cub in order for people to use them in photo props is the silliest thing I ever heard,” yet another mentioned.
JFK Animal Rescue and Shelter, yet another group which highlighted the incident on its social media, mentioned that the cub was becoming kept at the photography studio itself.
“The studio’s management told us that the lion cub was brought [to the studio] by a friend of theirs that owned it, and according to them it was a plain coincidence that the couple was also present, so they decided to take a few pictures with the lion cub,” Zulfishan Anushay, the founder of JFK, told The Independent.
In an Instagram post, the organisation explained that possessing a wild animal in Pakistan is not illegal if one has a license. “How can one take legal actions when these people have licenses to own these cubs? Once you get a license in Pakistan you can treat these poor cubs as you want,” they wrote.