Patna, July 24 :    Patna, July 24:  The old lion stared vacantly at the sun, his tongue hanging out of his mouth, as he rested on his two paws spread as much forward as possible in the cramped trolley-on-wheels that has been his home for the past one month in the circus maidan. Twenty lions, a couple of Royal Bengal tigers, a monkey and a bear are struggling for survival ever since they were abandoned by the Ajanta Circus company a month ago. The curtains abruptly came down on the popular show last month, the result of a protracted legal battle between the Centre and the circus company. Ajanta was forced to pack up and leave after it first faced a raid by wildlife protection officers from Sanjay Gandhi Zoological Gardens and then a notice to surrender their animals. Subsequently, another notice, alleging cruelty to the animals, was slapped on the company. The dispute on the possession of banned animals and their exhibition finally went to Patna High Court. As the legal battle dragged on, the owners of Ajanta Circus shifted their establishment but left behind the animals, whose fate has been sealed till the court makes a final decision. The cruelty case is before the Patna district magistrate. Sitting in their one-and-half by two-and-half metre-wide trolleys, the two Royal Bengals growled as onlookers, cashing on the free amusement, provoked them. Hungry for several days except when individual animal lovers offered them some pieces of meat, the tigers cut a sorry figure. The cleavages on the stomach sunk deeper. Their roars were muted. At one corner, a bear, dumped in a similar small cage, tossed restlessly raising its mouth in the sun. Its groans seemed to mimic the motley crowd of passers-by. Close by was the cage of the monkey. It cringed into a corner and seemed to be trying to hide from the public show. It chirped in joy as two of the more generous pavement-dwellers tossed four bananas into the cage. Having devoured the bananas, the monkey went into a routine of trained behaviour: even in the small cage, it gave a show of gymnastics taught by the circus masters. But the 20 lions are the worst off. Of them four are babies, two of them four months old. One of the lions, described as the oldest, is gasping for breath and could die any day. Without food for some days, the animal can't even get up. 'It is in such a pathetic state that it couldn't get up when some food was distributed by the local people,' said Sanjay Ahir, a shop owner. The animals' misery began on June 22 when the Central wildlife officers carried out a surprise raid of the circus tent. 'We showed the owners of the circus company the Central government notice for cancelling the certificate of ownership, issued on May 18, 2001. We told them that exhibition or training of the animals was illegal. We also directed the owners of the circus to deposit the animals to the Central government's designated rescue centres at Vizag, Tiruchirapally and Bangalore,' said Randhir Singh, director of the Sanjay Gandhi Zoological Gardens in Patna. Under the new law, even if circus companies had certificates of ownership, the zoo officers could cancel them. The government has to bear the expenses of transporting the animals from the circus to the rescue centres. The Circus Federation of India had appealed against the law, but the Kerala High Court and subsequently the Supreme Court had upheld the Centre's order. A spokesman for Ajanta Circus said the company had decided to file an appeal against the notice asking it to surrender the animals to the rescue centres. 'Though we were curtly told to surrender the animals, there was no elaboration on whether it was a temporary measure or we were meant to give them up forever. If we return the animals, we need to be compensated financially for we purchased them and fed them for long and the Central government acknowledged our property right by issuing certificates.' he said. If the circus companies have to surrender the animals without compensation, many of them would be ruined, he claimed. However, zoo officials maintained that under the Wildlife Protection Act, there was no provision for the government to purchase the animals.