Residents want firm steps to curb stray dog menace

Sukhmeet Bhasin

Tribune News Service

Bathinda, February 17

After a four-year-old kid mauled to death by a group of stray dogs in Taran Tarn, residents demanded that the Municipal Corporation (MC), Bathinda, must take concrete steps to curb the stray dog menace in the city.

Lashing out at the civic body and the district administration, they said the authorities concerned were waiting for the similar incident, which took place in Taran Taran, to happen in the city. The residents say a number of stray dogs can be spotted roaming at several places in the city.

The rise of the stray dog menace in Bathinda can be gauged from the fact that doctors at the Civil Hospital treated as many as 1,040 dog-bite victims in the past one year.

As per the information procured by Sonu Maheshwari, president, Naujawan Welfare Society, through the RTI Act, as many as 1,040 patients had came for getting anti-rabies injection at the Civil Hospital from May 1, 2015, to April 30, 2016. The actual figures of the dog-bite incidents were quite high as these figures were about only those cases which are reported at the Civil Hospital.

In most of the cases, people rushed to private hospitals for anti-rabies treatment.

A doctor at the Civil Hospital said, “The stray dog menace is on the rise these days as two dog-bite cases, on an average, are being reported every day at the hospital.”

Even a few months back, the Mayor was bitten by a stray dog when he was inspecting some development work in Sanjay Nagar area, near his home.

Sakshi Goyal, a city resident, said, “It is the right time for the corporation to take stern steps to tackle the stray dog menace. Kids have stopped playing on the roads due to the fear of stray dogs.”

Another city resident Shahbaz Singh said, “Stray dogs are a big threat to human life, but the authorities concerned does not take any action to curb the menace. The administration should wake up from slumber as the lives of people are very costly.”

The situation has not improved despite tall claims made by the Animal Husbandry Department regarding sterilisation of dogs.

The civic body has already started the much-awaited dog sterilisation project to control the growing population of canines in the city.

The contract for the project has been given to an Aligarh-based company, Tripura Foundation, and workers of the company are conducting sterilisation of dogs in the city, despite this, it has failed to provide respite to the residents from stray dogs.

As per the scheme, the canines are caught, operated upon, fed and then released after due medical care and a proper diet is given to them. The cost of procedure per dog would cost around Rs 690.