A Sumatran orangutan seized from an apartment near Mumbai is back in Indonesia after two years

A young Sumatran orangutan rescued from illegal wildlife trade in India has been returned to Indonesia, Indonesia's Ministry of Forestry said on 19 October. The male orangutan, known in India as Rocky, has been renamed Heera, meaning “diamond,” and landed at Kualanamu International Airport in North Sumatra.

Found in an apartment, then two years of delays

Indian authorities rescued him from an apartment in the Thane area near Mumbai, in Maharashtra state, on 12 November 2024, when he was an estimated 18 to 20 months old, according to the ministry. He was cared for at Vantara, the Greens Zoological Rescue and Rehabilitation Centre in Jamnagar, Gujarat.

The return took about two years because of procedural hurdles and his poor health, Mongabay India reported. Yogesh Nilkand Warkad, the official overseeing the operation for India's CITES management authority in Mumbai, told Mongabay it was “the first successful repatriation of a seized CITES animal from India.”

The repatriation involved the Indian government, its Wildlife Crime Control Bureau, Vantara, Indonesia's consulate general in Mumbai, Fauna Land Indonesia and the Centre for Orangutan Protection, the ministry said.

Quarantine, then a “jungle school”

Heera now goes to the Sumatran Rescue Alliance in Langkat regency, North Sumatra, run by the Centre for Orangutan Protection. Forestry Minister Raja Juli Antoni said the next steps are rehabilitation and protecting orangutan habitat. After quarantine he will attend a “jungle school”; if all goes to plan he could be released in about four years, conservation adviser Sinan Serhadli told Mongabay.

Five more babies are still in India

Five other infant orangutans, found abandoned in a forest in Odisha state, remain at Nandankanan Zoological Park while authorities investigate their origin and suspected trafficking, according to Mongabay. Indonesia has proposed sending a seven-member team of officials, veterinarians and orangutan specialists to assess them; India has agreed in principle, but arrangements are still being made.

Other animals returned home from trafficking include the gorilla Bili, flown from Nigeria back to Congo.