Soon, residents to get relief from stray dog menace: Chandigarh Mayor

Tribune News Service

Chandigarh, March 1

Newly elected Mayor Kuldeep Kumar Dhalor today said city residents would soon get relief from the stray dog menace. Residents have regularly been raising a concern over cases of dog bites.

The Mayor was reacting to a representation submitted by the Residents’ Welfare Association of Sector 27, Chandigarh. He said the problem would be dealt with seriously and a comprehensive plan drawn up to check the menace.

Capacity of sterilisation centres to go up

Earlier, only 100 dogs were being neutered in the Sector 38 centre, but now 300 more are being sterilised at the Raipur Kalan centre. In the coming days, the capacity of these two centres will be increased to 600. —Kuldeep Kumar Dhalor, City Mayor

Dhalor said earlier, the local municipal corporation (MC) was lacking vehicles to pick up stray dogs and sterilise them, but now it had seven vehicles. “This will facilitate sterilisation of stray dogs, which will help in controlling their population and helping people get relief from the long-standing problem,” he said. The Mayor said sterlisation was now being done on Sundays as well besides till late in the evening on other days of the week. Due to this, the population of strays in the city had started decreasing. He said earlier there was only one sterilisation centre in the city (in Sector 38), which had a capacity of 100 dogs. However, an animal birth control centre had been opened in Raipur Kalan village, which had the capacity to sterilise 310 dogs.

He added that the capacity of sterilisation centres would be increased in the near future. Earlier, only 100 dogs were neutered in Sector 38, but now over 400 were being sterilised at the two centres in the city. In the coming days, the capacity would be increased to 600.

Notably, despite big sterilisation claims of the MC, the number of dog bite cases in the city had doubled in 2023 vis-a-vis a year before. In 2022, 5,365 persons were bitten by canines, while the number jumped to 10,621 upto December last year. The MC claimed it had got more than 22,000 stray dogs sterilised through private agencies at a cost of Rs 2.14 crore since 2015 in an attempt to contain the dog population.

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