Ionic pinchin and pinchout gestures don't seem to work with android

Question

this is my pinch zone.

<div class="pinch-div" #pinchDiv></div>

related properties

gesture: Gesture;
@ViewChild('pinchDiv') element;

initialization

this.angle = 15;
this.gesture = new Gesture(this.element.nativeElement);
this.gesture.listen();
//this.gesture.on('pinch', e => this.pinchEvent(e, this.angle));

this.gesture.on('pinchin', e => this.pinchInEvent(e, this.angle));
this.gesture.on('pinchout', e => this.pinchOutEvent(e, this.angle));

functions

    pinchEvent(event, angle){
        console.log('pinch event detected');
        angle += 3;

        if(angle > 215){
            angle = 215
        }

        if(angle < 15){
            angle = 15;
        }

        console.log(angle);
        this.angleChanged.next(angle);
    }

    pinchInEvent(event, angle){
        if(angle >= 15){
            angle -= 3;
        }
        this.angleChanged.next(angle);
    }

    pinchOutEvent(event, angle){
        if(angle <= 215){
            angle += 3;
        }
        this.angleChanged.next(angle);
    }

Observations

pinchEvent() fires up in android even if two fingers are pressed down within the pinch zone. If I hold two fingers in #pinchDiv, i get bunch of 'pinch event detected' logs. I don't think holding down two fingers is a pinch. However, upon commenting out that line and only listening to 'pinchin' and 'pinchout', my pinchInEvent() and pinchOutEvent() are not fired on respective gestures. On the other hand, weird behavior of pinchEvent() firing on just two fingers hold is not observed and 'pinchin' and 'pinchout' are fired just fine in IOS. I'm not sure if there is some quirk of android that I need to add. I'm just looking for some directions and recommendations.