Krutika Surana
The killing of stray dogs has been on the rise for some time now as the incidence of dog bites in Kerala is increasing due to people poisoning the homeless.
Another 24 dogs were killed in Kerala’s Ernakulum district some of them were puppies, The local Panchayat admits to their great disgust. In Kalady, they got massive support from locals and as they said killing them was the better way, people who got arrested before for killing also got bail
The streets are home to an estimated 2,80,000 strays, another 9,00,000 dogs are kept as pets in Kerala. Incidents of stray dogs attacking women, children, or old people are common but this year to date around 1,00,000 people have suffered stray dog bites and 21 rabies deaths have been reported. A lot of strays were found dead and people are resorting to poisoning as people take matters into their own hands.
In Kochi, five dogs were killed by suspected poisoning; these dogs were looked after by the resident’s association. Leading a direction by the Society for Prevention of Cruelty to Animals (SPCA) Ernakulam, the postmortem of dead dogs was done at Tripunithura.
The SPCA Ernakulam Secretary TK Sajeev said that “These dogs were not strays. They were community dogs looked after by the resident’s association to guard the area. Five dogs collapsed and died in front of residents. We suspect someone had poisoned the dogs. We suspect more dogs were poisoned”. The samples have been sent to the government chemical laboratory in Kakkanad for analysis.
