THIRUVANANTHAPURAM: Even as the state government has moved the Supreme Court seeking permission to cull dangerous and rabid dogs, the state lacks scientific mechanisms to dispose of animal carcasses in a respectful and environment-friendly manner. Despite the growing pet and stray population in the state and apart from budget proposals, none of the local bodies has set up pet crematoriums to dispose of the animal carcasses in a scientific manner.
As per the animal husbandry department statistics, the state has around nine lakh pet animals and 2.8 lakh stray dogs. The Supreme Court is likely to issue an interim order in the government’s plea on Wednesday. The Animal Welfare Board of India recently issued an order directing all states to set up animal crematoriums or incinerators in every district to dispose of the bodies of pets and stray animals and prevent air, water and other environmental pollution.
State Animal Welfare Board member Maria Jacob said the local bodies have failed to set up such facilities. “It’s not being scientifically handled by any of the local bodies in the state. PFA (People For Animal) has set up a Thumburmuzhy model disposal mechanism for treating animal carcasses. This could be easily replicated by local bodies as it’s easy to set up and cost effective,” said Maria.
Animal Welfare Board of India former member and activist M N Jayachandran said animal lovers are expecting a favourable order from the Supreme Court. “This is not the right approach and the government should show some courage to admit the failure of our system instead of coming up with such appeals. Also, the statistics on the dog bite cases are not right and even cow or cat bites are being reported as dog bites in the government records. There should be clear classification on the type of bites,” said Jayachandran.
The appeal by the Kerala government seeking permission from the Supreme Court to kill dangerous and rabid dogs hasn’t gone down well with animal lovers in the state. Many feel that even friendly dogs would behave aggressively towards strangers and it is impossible to catch aggressive dogs.
“The Kerala government claims to kill only dangerous and vicious dogs but how are they going to identify such dogs? Who is going to monitor this? What is going to happen is that friendly community dogs would be killed ruthlessly as it’s impossible to catch dangerous and aggressive dogs,” Maria said.