Five baby orangutans turning up in an Odisha forest should not be treated as an oddity of the animal kingdom. It is a warning about the reach of international wildlife trafficking and, potentially, about India’s place in that illicit trade. The animals could not have reached Balasore naturally. They belong to rainforests thousands of kilometres away in Indonesia and Malaysia. Their discovery together, without adults, points overwhelmingly towards human transportation. Their apparent familiarity with people makes the possibility of captivity before abandonment even harder to dismiss. What makes the case significant is the emerging Indonesian connection.

Indonesia has entered discussions with Indian authorities and sought the return of the animals if their Indonesian origin is established. Preliminary assessment has reportedly raised the possibility that they are Sumatran orangutans, although DNA testing will be necessary to establish their provenance conclusively. That distinction matters. It would be premature to declare that Indonesia is the source of this particular consignment, still less to identify those responsible. But the possibility........

© The Statesman