New Delhi: A doctor from India is stuck in war-torn Ukraine and has been holed up in a basement at home with his big pet cats -- a black panther and a jaguar.
Dr Girikumar Patil prefers to live in a bunker under his home in Severodonetsk, Donbas, as he does not want to leave his pet cats back in Ukraine at the mercy of others.
Separatists rule the region, and the situation is rapidly deteriorating as the Russian invasion of Ukraine entered its 12th day. Dr Patil, on the other hand, is unwilling to abandon the creatures, news agency ANI reported.
"I called the Embassy but didn't get a proper response. My place is surrounded by Russians but I'm trying my best. I treat them like my kids," ANI quoted Dr Patil as saying.
Dr Patil moved to Ukraine in 2007 to study medicine and eventually lived in Donbas.
According to The New Indian Express, he then worked as an orthopaedic surgeon at a local government hospital.
He spotted the "orphaned and ailing" jaguar at a nearby zoo and adopted it with approval from officials. Yasha is the name given by Dr Patil to the animal. Dr Patil has named the jaguar Yasha. Two months ago, he brought the black panther, named Sabrina, as a mate to Yasha.
Patil, who hails from Andhra Pradesh, said he spent $35,000 to buy the panther and the jaguar from the Kyiv zoo about 20 months ago.
According to the BBC, Patil has only been out of his bunker to get food for his animals since the conflict began. The male jaguar is 20 months old and the female panther is a six-month-old cub, BBC reported.
"My big cats have been spending nights in the basement with me. There has been a lot of bombing happening around us. The cats are scared. They are eating less. I can't leave them," Patil was quoted by BBC in its report.
Dr Giri said he had bought 23kg of sheep, turkey and chicken from neighbouring villages at prices four times higher than normal.
Patil also owns three dogs, all Italian mastiffs, and uses his YouTube channel, which has over 84,000 followers, to collect donations for them.