Where are the real dog-lovers?

By Dr. K. Javeed Nayeem, MD

The vexing and all too real street dog problem, widely prevalent across the country, seems to be defying a workable solution, thanks to the opposing interests of the dog-fearing and the dog-loving groups.

It is strange that we are unable to come up with a practicable compromise formula, acceptable to all, although we are well-known for making compromises of every kind and coexisting with many other problems, of a much greater magnitude in our daily lives.

On one side of the divide are completely helpless citizens, plagued day and night, by the problems and perils posed by the presence of vicious street dogs, some of which can even be rabid and who want some semblance of safety and tranquillity in their lives. On the other side are dog-lovers and animal rights activists who are opposed to any of the really effective measures to control them and contain their ever-growing population.

That the population of street dogs is only showing an upward trend is an established fact, supported by statistics which clearly indicate that all our present strategies to contain it are not being of much use.

This alone should be an indicator that we are not on the right path to achieving our goal. But when you also take into account the other irrefutable fact that many citizens are regularly being attacked by vicious street dogs each passing day, resulting even in many deaths, it is an indication that the not-so-harsh and dog-friendly approach advocated by dog-lovers and animal rights activists needs to be changed to something more stringent and effective.

Mind you, it has been estimated that nearly 1.7 crore people are bitten by stray dogs while 20,000 of them die of rabies in India every year. This translates into 46,000 dog bites and 55 deaths in our country every day.

Staggering statistics indeed but sadly, still insufficient enough to change the mindsets and stands of some people, who seem to be able to understand only the animal side of the equation, while being insensitive to its human side.

Thankfully, the Supreme Court took cognisance of this problem and passed an order recently that all stray dogs should be permanently impounded in dog shelters created by government agencies. This would have been the most effective permanent solution but when this resulted in a huge hue and cry that it was too harsh a measure, the Court modified its order and said that all strays should be captured, spayed, de-wormed, immunised and left back into their former territories.

A little later, when things did not seem to be moving as expected, it even summoned the Chief Secretaries of many States to appear before it at 10.30 am on Nov. 3 and explain what action they had taken to implement this order and why it was not showing any results.

It took such a serious view of a lapse which it said was having a negative impact on the image of the country, that it rejected their requests for their virtual appearances and insisted on their physical presence.  It is notable that only the Chief Secretaries of just two States — Telangana and West Bengal — were exempted from this appearance because they had filed their compliance reports.

Now, in its most recent order, the Apex Court has mandated that all institutions, both government and private, within all Urban Local Bodies, across the country, should take the responsibility of informing the civic authorities about the number of stray dogs in their premises so that they can be picked up by their teams for sterilisation.

But in the case of dogs picked up from institutions, unlike in the case of dogs picked up from the streets, the Court has said that they should be held in dog shelters instead of being left free in their usual haunts. This makes it a very effective order but the difficulty that arises here is that because the Court has ordered that these institutions are to themselves bear the cost of this process, some of them may not do it with the required amount of sincerity and earnestness.

It is already a well-known fact that across the country, many of the NGOs and other agencies that have been vested with the responsibility of sterilising stray dogs are not doing an effective job. It has even been alleged that many of them are only fudging their records to show more sterilisations than what they actually do, to create fake bills and collect more money from the government.

This allegation seems to be largely true because we are regularly seeing the so-called sterilised stray dogs, which are marked as such with their ear tips nipped, continuing to have litters every few months, in the localities where they are released.

This would not have been the case if there were no flaws in the performance of the system vested with this responsibility. While we can all hope that with the latest directive being a Supreme Court order, we can expect to see some change, there are a few questions that come to my mind.

When there are so many people who oppose any of the so-called harsher measures to contain the stray dog population and who advocate extreme compassion, why are there hardly any people willing to adopt street dogs and have them as pets in their own homes? This would undisputedly be the most compassionate, easy and soul-satisfying thing to do for any real dog-lover and it will be the best long-term solution to the problem of strays.

But when we find hardly any takers for this easy solution to the stray dog problem, it only shows that all those who take up a stand in their defence are doing so only to be seen as dog-lovers, without really being so. Why is it that people go to any length or any expense to have a pure-blooded pet dog but shun its humble but equally lovable sibling on the street, expecting it to get its care, food and shelter from someone else or brave the elements and fend for itself? Does this not smack of discrimination, based on despicable double standards? Do think about it!

e-mail: kjnmysore@rediffmail.com