Uttarayan: concerns over bird fatalities during kite festival in India

Many birds get injured or killed as thousands take to the terraces to fly kites to celebrate Makar Sankranti on 14 January, marking the arrival of spring Kites will fill the skies in many parts of India on Wednesday for the festival of Makar Sankranti or Uttarayan, celebrating the onset of spring, but conservationists will be fearing the worst as they brace for another year of avian fatalities.The Jivdaya Charitable Trust (JCT), an animal welfare NGO, attended to 2,394 injured birds in Ahmedabad, the heartland of the kite flying festival, in the Indian state of Gujarat around this time last year. Of these, 490 died. Continue reading...