Recently a street bull wandered into our ashram. He had just been attacked by someone with a machete and had a very deep wound on his back. We called a doctor and he said it would not heal unless we kept him restrained for a month and did proper treatment, so we brought him inside and took care of him for a month.
We made a short video of his progress throughout the month until we could finally release him. If you have time to spare please watch it. Its 21 minutes long and shows his progress from day 1 until he was released. If you don’t have time, you can go to the end to see his happiness on being released. We gave him the name Shambhu.
On the first day the government veterinary doctor saw the wound, but said he cannot treat it unless we tie the bull down. Trying to tie down a bull who has never been restrained is very difficult and dangerous. This bull had a branding of a trishula on his thigh, which is a local custom that means he has been left free and given to Lord Shiva from his childhood to roam in the streets. He had never been tied or domesticated, so it was going to be a difficult task.
By the evening of the first day there were hundreds of maggots moving inside the wound, and the itching was becoming very uncomfortable for the bull. We kept spraying the wound with anti maggot spray and it brought some temporary relief for him, but the wound was so deep more waves of maggots kept coming out throughout the night. We kept spraying the anti maggot medication for each new wave, and they would die off till after some time the next wave from inside would come out.
By the second day the wound was giving off a terrible stench of rotting flesh. We managed to get him inside our fenced garden area, which made sure he could not escape before the treatment was completed. Later we were able to lure him into our old goshala room, where we could lock him in for the entire month.
On the third day we managed to get gosevakas from Bajrang Dal to come help, and they were able to temporarily tie up the wounded bull allowing the veterinary doctor to properly clean the infected wound and apply medicine. They continued coming every two days, going through the difficult process of tying and holding down the bull as the doctor would clean the wound and apply the medication. By the fifth day the last maggots deep in the wound had come out and died, and then antibiotic injections were started to clear up the infected and rotting wound.
The wound was so deep that even after a week there was still thick blood flowing out of it dripping down, but by then due to the antibiotics the rotting smell had cleared up and the slow healing process had started. By the 15th day the wound had started to join, though it was still wet and tender.
On the 26th day we felt we should let him out of the small room so that he could walk around and get some exercise, but we still kept him locked in the fenced garden area, as crows could peck at the wound if he went out into the street too early.
When we released him from that room, he was so happy that he was jumping around like wild, chasing us to play, not realizing how large he is and that he would flatten us if he jumped on us. He had been locked in a tiny 10 foot by 10 foot room for 26 days with practically no freedom to move anywhere. The whole time he was such a gentle animal and never complained or tried to beat us, or even try to rush through the door when we would go in to clean the room.
After freeing him, we kept him in the garden for a few more days to give the wound a little more time to dry and harden before finally letting him out of the compound to freedom. When we fully released him he happily ran down the road and immediately joined up with a group of cows. He must have been lonely not having seen another cow for a month.
The next morning at 6 am sharp he was back in our compound looking for us and asking us to feed him. Even after being released, Shambhu kept coming back 2 or 3 times every single day to be fed, and he keeps coming even now without fail, and we oblige him with large bowls of cow feed every time he shows up.
For the first few days after releasing him I would spray his wound with a protective medicinal coating, as flies could smell the wound and were constantly hovering around it even though it had already closed. After 5 days of this the flies stopped bothering him and the wound was finally fully gone, except for a small scar.
In this final update video you can see Shambhu the bull coming for his daily feeding, and the wound is hardly noticeable:
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