Mangaluru: With Pilikula Biological Park on high alert after reports of bird flue elsewhere in the State, tigers, Sambar, spotted deer and other animals in the park are now facing a health risk as untreated sewage water from a plant belonging to Mangaluru City Corporation has been flowing inside the park, emanating foul smell.

Sewage that has been flowing from the nearby Pachchanady Sewage Treatment Plant (STP) has stagnated in the moat of a display enclosure for tigers and also inside the enclosures of Sambar and spotted deer.

Sewage has been flowing out of the plant reportedly due to a technical snag in the STP because of poor maintenance.

Sewage, which entered the park from near the animal house for lions, entered the park close to the moat for tigers, then reached the enclosures for Sambar and spotted deer and finally joined the bund built to store rainwater near the Urban Hatt and got accumulated.

It has been flowing like a stream near the animal house of lions making a waterfall like sound. It entered the park at the same location from the STP on the upper reach just outside the compound wall of the park.

During a visit there on Tuesday, workers at the treatment plant agreed that sewage flowing out has not been treated due to a block in the STP.

Director of the park H. Jayaprakash Bhandary told  that the Executive Director of Dr. Shivaram Karanth Pilikula Nisargadhama, under which the zoo (or Pilikula Biological Park) falls, has written to the Commissioner of the city corporation as the issue is more than one month old now.

In addition, the city corporation has been reminded on several times to attend to the issue but to no avail. The animals in the park are facing the danger of being infected with bacterial diseases.

Incidentally, the Commissioner of the city corporation is the Administrative Committee Chairman of the nisargadhama. Commissioner Mohammed Nazir did not receive a phone call. However, an engineer of the city corporation, who agreed to the suggestion that there is an issue with the STP, said that it would be attended to on Wednesday.

Rajashekar Puranik, Environmental Officer, Karnataka State Pollution Control Board (KSPCB), said that he would send an official of the board for inspection on Wednesday.