This is a News article published recently in the Chennai Metroplus. I know its long , for quick reading just follow the italicized lines.
The legend of Zorro could have ended very differently. After all, unlike his caped vigilante namesake, Doggie Zorro wasn’t discovered fending off bad guys with a deadly sword. (In fact, if he had actually met any bad guys, his first instinct wo uld probably have been to lovingly chew their shoelaces.)
This frightened black Labrador was found sitting sadly on a pavement at Rutland Gate last week. Fortunately for him, Rina Raymond, who was driving past, took him home. He was covered with ticks, undernourished and terrified of traffic, but clearly a beautiful, one-year-old. The next day Rina and her friend Menaka Gulvadi walked him around Rutland Gate, hoping he would be able recognise his home. He couldn’t. By day three, the girls had set up a ‘Find Black Boy a Home’ Facebook group. Almost a 100 people joined. Some offered to adopt the dog.
Menaka decided to keep him in the end, and he was named Zorro.
Zorro’s currently joyfully galloping around her house, cuddling up to visitors and gently playing with Menaka’s four-year-old niece (pilfering her toys sneakily in the process). Meanwhile, Rina is working on making the Facebook group a permanent resource for finding homes for abandoned dogs.
For, Zorro is just one of many pets that end up on the street. He got lucky. Other dogs, most pure-breds (commonly referred to as pedigrees), dumped like this end up getting hit by traffic, attacked by other dogs or starving.
“I have seen people throwing a Great Dane out of a Tata Sumo and driving away,” says C. Padmavathy, managing trustee, Animal Welfare Protection Trust, discussing the alarming trend of abandoning pets, which seems to have increased over the past few months. “We have picked up so many dogs from outside the airport — a golden retriever, a terrier…” she adds, talking of how people callously leave the dogs in the traffic before moving out of the city.
Manifold excuses
The excuses are manifold. Relocating from houses to apartments, which don’t allow pets. Dogs falling ill, and owners don’t know how to deal with it. Worst of all, owners simply changing their minds.
Now, people who bought pedigree dogs (costing up to Rs. 75,000) on a whim, are abandoning them saying they’re expensive to maintain in these times of recession. “They say it’s because of the down turn — as if they needed an excuse,” says Dr. Chinny Krishna, chairman, Blue Cross of India, adding that as these dogs are often bought as status symbols, they’re traded in as easily as a car that’s gone out of fashion. (Think of the Vodaphone pug.) What’s worse is they usually buy from illegal breeders. “They run what are essentially puppy mills,” says Dr. Krishna, “It’s all for cash. The inbreeding is so high, the animals are treated like factories.”
It’s almost always the pedigrees that are abandoned. “Anyone who takes a street dog already knows what he wants,” says Anuradha Sawhney, chief functionary of PETA India. “Pedigrees are a whim. A birthday or Christmas gift.” They’re bought like toys for children… She adds, “People don’t realise that a child grows up. A dog stays a child till the rest of its life.”
Sawhney says she’s seen pets being abandoned startlingly often. “As I’m driving by, I see a dog running desperately in one direction, chasing the car that dropped him off.” She adds that they’re usually dazed, bewildered and terrified. What’s makes this abandonment all the more heartless is the fact that these are often dogs that have lived for years with a family, as part of the family.
Unable to survive
Unlike street savvy mongrels, they are unable to survive on their own. Sawhney says, “If let loose, they’re the first to get hit by cars. They don’t realise that street dogs have territories, and they get attacked. They’re used to food coming to them, and can’t scavenge. And they don’t know how to drink water from a ditch.”
However, no matter how bewildered they are, Padmavathi says she’s found that they always affectionate towards their rescuers. “They seem to have a sixth sense and realise we’re trying to help... so they are calm. They co operate.” And if they’re lucky — like Zorro — they find new families to fit into, look after and love with unbeatable gratitude.
HOW YOU CAN HELP
- Don’t buy a dog. This will discourage illegal breeders. Besides, you wouldn’t buy a friend, would you?
- Get a puppy only if you’re ready to take care of it. With the great joy they bring comes great responsibility.
- To adopt an abandoned dog call Blue Cross on weekdays (Monday-Saturday)
during office hours at 2250 1399 or 2250 1839. Or email mailto:bluecrossofindia@gmail.com at any time for details. - You can also call The Animal Welfare and Protection at Trust 22781381 or 99629-68265 to find homes for homeless pets.
- Courtesy 'The Hindu ' Metroplus Chennai
June 22nd ,2009
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