Pooja Bhatt Wins PETA India’s ‘Hero to Animals’ Award

Pooja Bhatt. (photo via IANS/IMDB.com)

MUMBAI – Indian filmmaker-actress Pooja Bhatt has been honored with a ‘Hero to Animals’ award from PETA India on International Animal Rights Day.

Pooja, daughter of filmmaker Mahesh Bhatt and Lorraine Bright, who is also known as Kiran Bhatt, said: “I’m truly grateful to PETA for giving me this award. I thank my mother for inculcating in me the need to look at another creature with the same degree of empathy and love and compassion as I’d like others to treat me with. If only I could be that person that my dog really thinks I am. I try hard to be that person. I shall continue to speak up.”

The filmmaker-actress has supported PETA India’s campaign to ban horse-drawn carriages in Mumbai, supported a call for the release of a captive elephant named Malti who was mercilessly beaten near Jaipur and informed people on social media how easily ‘manja’ can injure and kill birds.

She also practices what she preaches by keeping meat off her plate, adopting animal companions from the street and even helping to sterilize cats in her neighborhood.

“Animals have an unflagging defender in Pooja Bhatt,” said Sachin Bangera, PETA India director of Celebrity and Public Relations.