LM NEWS 24

Animal Rights Body Calls For #StopKeralaKillings Via Tweetathon

By LokMarg 1st July 2023

An animal rights group has called upon all animal lovers across the country to launch a ‘Tweetathon’ at 6 pm on Saturday, July 1, to condemn the periodic incidents of killings of dogs in Kerala with a hashtag #StopKeralaKillings, according to a press statement issued by the organisation.

Noted animal rights activist Ambika Shukla who is a trustee of People for Animals, said in its appeal: “Kerala seems to like killing. Nothing else explains its bizarre attitude to man’s best friend, the dog.”

For 50 years after Independence, Indian municipalities were killing street dogs. Yet the numbers continued to remain the same as this is neither a scientific nor sustainable solution, the statement said.

Finally, the Court stepped in to halt this needless brutality and India switched over to a sensible WHO programme wherein dogs are sterilised, vaccinated and replaced in their original areas. The ABC (animal birth control) programme was launched in 2001 via a very successful pilot project in Jaipur. It proved that numbers can be regulated, bites ended snd rabies eliminated. Within just a few years, Jaipur was declared a rabies-free city.

Since then, ABC has been adopted with varying degrees of success depending on how well and systematically it has been implemented.

“In spite of the ABC programme being available, Kerala continued to kill dogs. In 2915, in a stare wide pogrom , almost 1 lakh dogs were murdered,” Ms Shukla alleged. “Following international outrage, Kerala was directed by Court to introduce the ABC programme. Even then, to whom did the state entrust this programme? To a women empowerment group with no idea of how to run the programme. Given the huge corruption and mismanagement wherein only a total of 16000 dogs were sterilised over 4 years at a cost of over rs 2 crores, the Kerala High Court directed the Govt to close and restart the programme properly.”

Instead of doing so, again the Kerala Govt wants to go back to killing– a failed, regressive policy that has never yielded any results except untold misery to lakhs of sentient beings for no human benefit.

“Not only have various Kerala organisations appealed to SC to sanction killing, but even before any court sanction, killings have spread throughout the state with people taking the law and sticks into their own hand,” Ms Shukla said.

Openly poisoning formulas snd methods are being exchanged on social media chat groups, all manner of torture instruments are being ordered and killing is carrying on openly without any state or pokice intervention to stop this cruel and illegal brutality.

In one case in Kollam, a mother sheltering her 6 newborn pups in the home of a lady and her granddaughter, was attacked by a gang of men who broke into the house and beat her to death. The incident was captured on cctv camera and national outrage forced the police to lodge an FIR.

Similar incidents are rife across the state.

What it needs is for the State to issue strict notices and directions to the police to take strong immediate action to deter cruelty. Civic organisations like the Church, schools, and local leaders must step in to quell public fears against dogs and publicise the benefits of the ABC programme. And most of all a state timebound sterilisation and vaccination drive must be launched through credible NGOs.

Regulating dog numbers, ending bites and eliminating rabies is as simple as ABC, Ms Shukla said.