Last Updated on April 14, 2026 by admin
For 15 days, a cat sat inside a concrete metro pillar in Kochi, Kerala — wedged between steel and stone with no food, no water anyone could reach, and no way down.
Nobody knows how he got up there. The pillar stands near Kaloor Stadium, part of the Kochi Metro Rail system, towering over a busy stretch of road where autorickshaws idle between fares. At some point in early February 2026, drivers noticed a small face peering out from a gap between pillars 556 L, 556 M, and 556 R. A stray cat had climbed into the structure and gotten himself stuck.
The drivers started calling him Subhash.
The name came from Manjummel Boys, a Malayalam film that had swept Kerala the year before. In the movie, a young man named Subhash falls deep into a cave while exploring with friends. His rescue becomes the heart of the story — his friends refusing to leave, lowering themselves into the dark to pull him out. The autorickshaw drivers saw the same thing happening above their heads, in slow motion, on a metro pillar. A creature trapped where nobody could reach him. So the name stuck.
Metro staff spotted Subhash early on and tried to leave food and water where he could reach it. But the cat kept moving between gaps in the pillar structure — close enough to see, too deep inside to grab. Days passed. His body thinned. He stopped moving as much.
Photos and videos started circulating online. People in Kochi began asking the same question: why hasn’t anyone gotten him down yet?
The answer was the pillar itself. The structure carries live electrical lines for the metro rail system. You can’t just send someone up with a ladder. Reaching Subhash meant shutting down metro services, cutting power to overhead lines, bringing in heavy equipment, and doing all of it without spooking a frightened, weakened cat into falling.
By the second week, the pressure mounted. Animal welfare volunteers contacted Kochi Metro Rail Ltd. Local media covered the story daily. The autorickshaw drivers who had named him kept watch from below, updating anyone who asked.
On Saturday night, February 21, KMRL made the call. They would shut it down.
The power supply to the overhead lines was cut. Metro services were suspended for 17 minutes as a precaution while crews moved into position. Traffic in the area was restricted. A crane and hydraulic lift were brought to the base of the pillar.
Personnel from the Gandhi Nagar Fire Station led the operation, joined by animal welfare volunteers. They called it Operation Subhash.
The work was slow. Subhash had spent two weeks learning every crevice of that pillar, and he kept retreating deeper into gaps rescuers couldn’t follow. They moved carefully, avoiding sudden noise or light. One wrong move and the cat could bolt — or worse, fall from the height that had kept him prisoner.
Six hours passed.
At 1:30 in the morning on Sunday, February 22, a rescuer at the top of the crane finally secured Subhash in a net. They placed him into a carrier box. And then, from the crowd that had gathered below in the middle of the night — people who had stayed to watch, who had followed this story for two weeks — cheers broke out.
A special ambulance was waiting. Subhash was driven to the animal hospital in Thoppumpady for a full health check. He was weak — 15 days without reliable food will do that — but he was alive, and he was out.
Here’s what stayed with people after the headlines moved on: a city shut down its transit system in the middle of the night for a stray cat with no owner and no pedigree. Firefighters worked a six-hour shift on a crane for an animal that couldn’t thank them. Autorickshaw drivers who earn by the fare spent two weeks watching a pillar, giving a cat a name, and refusing to forget about him.
Nobody had to do any of it. That’s the part worth remembering.
The drivers still pass that pillar every day. They still call it Subhash’s pillar.
What’s the bravest rescue story you’ve ever seen? Tell us in the comments 👇