Animal lovers protest Chandigarh MC’s action of picking up stray dogs

The animal lovers have lodged a protest against the Municipal Corporation (MC) for picking up stray dogs from a park in Manimajra.

The development comes after the civic body on Saturday picked up 15 stray dogs, who were said to be of old age, and took them to the Animal Birth Control unit run by the civic body at Raipur Kalan.

Payal Puri, a dog feeder from Manimajra, who found the dogs missing when she went to Shivalik Garden to feed them, said, “I was told that the MC van cruelly trapped these 15 dogs in their van and took them to Raipur Kalan. I don’t know why they picked these dogs and put them in a sterilisation unit when they are all sterilised and vaccinated.”

Payal and her mother were not allowed to see the dogs despite requesting the security guards at the centre.

Monica Sachdeva, who runs Kabila, an NGO for animals, reached out to Dr Ravinder S Dhaliwal, Superintendent, Medical Officer of Health, MC. “He told me the civic body picked up the dogs on the basis of a media report that alleged that some residents have complained about them barking at them,” she said, while alleging that what MC has done was “illegal” as per the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals Act, 1960, which states that dogs cannot be picked up unless there is a rabies case or if the dog is not sterilised.

“If anyone has a problem with a dog, the MC can only act on the basis of an official complaint made to either the police or them, not on a newspaper article,” she claimed.

According to Payal and Monica, there was no official complaint to the police of any dog bite from that garden.

She alleged that four out of 15 dogs have gone missing from the MC facility while three of the remaining 11 have injury marks on them.

“Our biggest fear is that the MC will relocate these old dogs, under pressure from some influential person, who is making these complaints against the dogs,” they added.

Dhaliwal, meanwhile, said, “The residents have been asking us to take preemptive measures out of fear of being bitten. We are stuck between the animal feeders and residents complaining about stray dogs.”

Chandigarh