The Hindu : Other States / Orissa News : Stray dog menace in millennium city

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Saturday, Jul 07, 2007
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Stray dog menace in millennium city

Correspondent

Fund crunch hits sterilisation of dogs

1,000 dogs sterilised every year in the city
On an average 10 cases of dog bites reported

CUTTACK: The stray dog sterilisation programme undertaken by the Cuttack Municipal Corporation (CMC) has suffered due to fund crunch. While the Animal Welfare Board of India (AWBI) has not released the proposed funds for the current fiscal, the civic body is unable to arrange funds for continuation of the programme for the past three months.

The AWBI under the Union Ministry of Environment Protection has not yet released the proposed grant-in-aid of Rs 2.22 lakhs for the birth control and preventive vaccination of stray dogs of the city this year, CMC health officer Niranjan Das has said.

Tripartite accord

The AWBI, State Government and CMC reached a tripartite agreement in 2003 in which the Central board had agreed to provide Rs 10 lakhs for the purpose for five years.

"We are constantly reminding the AWBI to release the funds, but there has been no response from it yet," Dr Das told The Hindu on Monday.

“Although, the utilisation certificates (UCs) of the previous years were submitted in time, we fail to understand why our funds for this year have not been released yet,” the health officer wondered.

Concerned over the menace, the civic body had undertaken the drive since 2004 in which at least 1000 dogs were sterilized every year, sources said. Dogged with the menace, the city is now in throes of a crisis as an estimated 50,000 stray canines rule the roost creating havoc in the narrow lanes and by lanes of the city.

Dog bites and road accidents due to stray dogs are not uncommon to any part of the millennium city.

One Biswanath Patnaik (34), a resident of Matha Sahi in Tulsipur area, died last week when he met with an accident trying to escape from a pack of stray dogs. Everyday the SCB Medical College and hospital receives at least 10 cases of dog bites on an average while private hospitals and nursing homes receive a substantial number of such cases regularly, sources said.

The civic body authorities are now finding it extremely difficult to control the increasing population of stray dogs in the city’s 48 wards. The situation warrants spaying and neutering of at least 10,000 stray dogs in a year.

A city based NGO Mahila Vikash Samiti, which has some expertise in carrying out the drive, spends at least Rs 400 per each dog towards catching and carrying them to the dog yard for immunization, sterilization and providing them food and medicine for at least seven days, sources said.

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