On Fri, 11/3/11, Muntazar Mustaffa wrote:
Dear All
A friend of mine had this to say to an US based animal lover who was appalled by the reports on so-called massacre of dogs in Kashmir:
I wished that this message reaches you too
“Let me tell you there is more of noise in the campaign against so called massacre of poor creatures. Not a single dog would have died in such a brutal manner had these animal lovers ever tried to find a solution to the problem. The Animal Welfare Board of India has done pretty little during past five or six years of its stepping in to the state. Its total aid of Rs 1.0 lac could not fetch the SPCA-Kashmir even right kind of surgical tools to work with. Instead of criticizing the Srinagar Municipality it ought to have worked for introducing ABC-ARV on a large scale in the valley which has more than 200,000 stray dogs and which have bitten more than 7000 people during past 11 years. In recent times three innocents lost lives due to rabies. Hundreds of dog-bite cases are reporting at district and SMHS Hospital every month and it is costing them a fortune in terms of costs of treatment and loss of work days. The problem is very complex and there is tremendous pressure on the Divisional Administration to do something credible to fight the menace before people organise lynching of these poor creatures on a large scale. Let every animal lover persuade AWBI to do everything to put ABC-ARV in place in Kashmir instead of becoming paper tigers or e-mail tigers!”
11 March 2011
I appreciate that a conscious citizen like you has stepped into the debate. I am aware and glad both, that our common friends have been very kind to get you in. I am grateful for your passionate views as a person that seems genuinely interested in resolution of a long standing social problem that you rightly outline has been slept over for decades. Slept over by whom – the dogs or the planners! Was it the responsibility of the dogs to plan or that of the Municipal administrators. Should the dogs be killed because the administrators failed us? Let us fix the culpability and complicity as well as the motives behind this method madness dispassionately.
If the paper tigers were inconvenient to the SMC why didn’t it emulate the Municipal organisations in the rest of India to bring in specialist and capable NGOs that could deliver results. Fact is it had many offers even last year from a host of NGOs. Who stalled that and why? I have governmental minutes of meetings deciding upon to adopt that course of action. Who circumvented their implementation? It is not as though the SMC was ever deterred by protestations of the paper tigers over its wanton and regular dog poisoning. Problem is suddenly it seems to have woken up to the futility of this method that has far from containing the dog population actually helped in its proliferation. Blaming the activists doesn’t detract from the above home truths? Media reports document the SMC poisoning all along from time to time.
ABC as a concept was introduced in the Valley way back in 2001. SPCA Kashmir actively contributed to the inception of the programme. In order to lay the Institutional basis for the programme the SMC was required to commit a certain amount of wherewithal and assurance to the AWBI to adhere to scientific, humane methods prescribed in the ABC charter enable central funding and expertise for the same. An MoU was required to be signed Govt to Govt. The SMC flatly and outrightly refused to enter into any such understanding steadfastly until 2008. The refusal meant that even the handful of dogs sterilized were eventually also put to the sword of the strychnine poison. Is this not true? On what occasion and basis did the AWBI ask the SMC to work on a shoe string budget of Rs 1 lakh that you quote. Please enlighten us. By the way what stops the J&K Govt that is perpetually fishing funds in Delhi from seeking assistance on a frontline public health issue sich as this? Has it been refused ever? A Govt that spends billions on upkeep of
Sensing the magnitude of the problem, in 2008 the SPCA Kashmir again sought the help of the AWBI to revive the ABC in view of the massive dog proliferation that you rightly mention. A fifteen day pilot project was launched in may 2008 and top officials of the AWBI flew in to Srinagar to flag off the project. Voluntary NGOs other than the AWBI and SPCA also offered help and human resource. However, on day one of the inauguration itself the Commissioner and Mayor Srinagar Municipal Corporation eventually ended up repeating their obstinacy of 2001 and in full media glare refused to have anything to do with ABC or ARV programme. This stands widely reported by the media. No MoU was allowed to be signed! Is this not true?
In between 2001 i.e the inception of ABC in Srinagar and 2008 the dog proliferation took place in geometric proportions. The SMC and J&K Govt kept living in denial persisting throughout with the outdated and ineffective poison drive methods again widely reported by the Media – both local and national. What fault can be laid at the door step of the AWBI, the noise makers or the NGOs that were more than willing to make a social contribution and yet scorned and kept at bay? Didn’t the AWBI and SPCA together with a host of NGOs of repute and accredited record in ABC/ARV operations offer the State Govt containment programmes and solutions that it kept religiously rejecting obdurately? If you want I will post right here on the Internet the hundreds of Memorandums between the AWBI and the State on one hand and the NGOs and the SMC on the other exchanged on this and the continued refusal of the SMC to budge? Why?
Where and when did the paper tigers stall the resolution of the problem? I am also anguished and constrained to put on record the fact of SMC officials being involved in clandestine purchases and misappropriation of the funds meant for dog poison? Is this not a matter of shame and in official record before the State Vigilance Organization. I am making the documents public shortly.
It takes two to tango. The progress that could have been registered in the past decade and a half has been stalled by vested interests not the e-mail tigers. Up until yesterday the SMC Commr. was making the right kind of noises and denying any poisoning at all. Now that the issue is in public domain as well as under the media glare and the desirability of methods being debated it is all very well for him to say that the AWBI and the paper tigers are an impediment to his avowed objectives of dog containment. The proof of the pudding must lie in its eating. I am afraid events and record do not vindicate him or his noble intent.
I will be happy to provide you with all related information and governmental official SMC documents – that I intend to make public in any case to make the general public aware of the diversionary tactics.
Sincerely yours
(JAVED IQBAL)
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