After Another Horse Death, PETA India Launches New “Don’t Take Carriage Rides!” Billboard Campaign in Kolkata

For Immediate Release:

13 May 2026

Contact:

Chumki Dutta; [email protected]

Varulika Dixit; [email protected]

Kolkata – After a young mare died after being found on death’s door under the Hastings Flyover near Maidan, People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals India (PETA India) has launched a billboard campaign in Kolkata with an impassioned plea to visitors and residents to reject cruel horse-drawn carriage rides. The message—which includes a heartbreaking image of the severely neglected mare—is located at VIP Road, Kestopur, Baguiati Flyover, Prafulla Kanan, Narayantala, near Netaji Subhas Chandra Bose International Airport.

On 14 April 2026, PETA India representatives found the approximately four-year-old mare left for dead. She was discovered starving and dehydrated. She had no sensation in her legs, no reflexes, an eye being eaten by maggots, and her body was oozing discharge. Despite the visible severity of her condition, her owner claimed she was “just sleeping” to avoid accountability. Despite rescue and veterinary efforts, she died shortly afterward. PETA India filed a First Information Report (FIR) against the owner for the severe neglect and cruelty that led to her deteriorated state.

“Horses are sensitive animals who deserve autonomy over the lives and to live free from enslavement and pain,” says PETA India Policy Associate Chumki Dutta. “PETA India encourages the public to steer clear of cruel and archaic horse-carriage rides.”

PETA India has repeatedly attended to horses who collapse on the roads or suffer in extremely poor physical conditions and are abandoned after being forced to haul tourist carriages in Kolkata. Horses have been found anaemic, malnourished, overworked, and collapsed from constant use on hard road surfaces in the Victoria Memorial area, where horses are used for riding and horse-drawn carriages for tourists.

The Calcutta High Court has taken serious note of incidents in which horses collapsed at the Maidan and at the adjoining area of Victoria Memorial, due to cruelty and neglect. The court also noted other issues, such as the widespread prevalence of unlicensed hackney carriages in the city and the high rate of abandonment of ailing and unfit horses by their owners, who cause traffic hazards. The court directed the state government to develop a proposal for rehabilitating horse owners and providing them with an alternative livelihood to hauling tourists in horse-drawn carriages so that “dispensing with the horse-drawn carriages as done in Mumbai can be considered and examined for its feasibility.” In Mumbai, following PETA India’s efforts in the Bombay High Court, Victoria carriages and horse-drawn carriages for tourists were replaced with heritage-style e‑carriages—a move preferred by the former horse owners.

PETA India – whose motto reads, in part, that “animals are not ours to abuse in any way” – opposes speciesism, a human-supremacist worldview. For more information, please visit PETAIndia.com or follow PETA India on X, Facebook, or Instagram.

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