“The greatness of a nation and its moral progress can be judged by the way its animals are treated.” Mahatma Gandhi
A feral (homeless) dog in the wilderness of Nubra valley near the mouth of Siachen Glacier. Pic: Azam
Unfortunately a pack of India's frustrated and elite minds in Wildlife Conservation think, preach and are allegedly involved in killing animals silently, more specifically the 'Homeless Indian Dog' which they term as 'feral'.
They believe 'killing' is the ultimate solution.
A 'Feral' animal (from Latin fera, "a wild beast") is an animal living in the wild but descended from domesticated individuals. (Source: Wikipedia)
Note that this animal never came on its own into the wild but DESCENDED FROM DOMESTICATED INDIVIDUALS.
India's wildlife for many years has co-existed with the human population, whether it is centuries old tribal villages or the encroacher habitats in and around protected wildlife areas that tend to increase in several folds every year shrinking the forest cover.
Corruption and lack of political will to address the eradication of human footprints from within India's protected wildlife areas has been a miserable failure.
When a human habitat comes up in the wilderness it does not just comprise of human beings alone.
Domesticated animals or companion animals form an integral part of such habitats.
Enter into any such habitat and you are bound to witness heads of cattle & livestock, packs of dogs, poultry, pigs and other animals.
With a ZERO mechanism of any Government policy on vaccination or sterilization of such animals in and around the fringe areas this has snowballed now into a situation where the population of homeless (feral) dogs has allegedly started attacking the fragile eco system which is directly resulting on the toll of wild animals.
Now the question arises that if the Government has failed to put in a mechanism to address this serious issue, what were the thousands of NGOs & biologists in question doing?
Didn't they anticipate this?
It is a known fact that domesticated animal populations from human settlements in and around wildlife areas do increase the potential for pathogen transmission into wild animals.
A recent study last year by the 'Wildlife Vets International' has shown that Tigers in the Wild are at risk from getting infected with CDV (Canine Distemper Virus) from homeless dogs.
No sooner did I get to read of this new finding, my fear for the worst that a knee jerk reaction to this by India's wildlife stakeholders could call for mass CULLING of the dogs got me into the act of writing out to the WVI (Wildlife Vets International) and seek their opinion to solving this problem.
WVI was prompt to respond immediately.
In their response email dated 13th June' 2013, Olivia Walter of WVI (Wildlife Vets International) had this to say:
"our current idea is to vaccinate dogs in and
around national parks to create a protective barrier to the disease.
Culling
the dogs would create a vacuum in which other dogs would arrive, potentially
with new diseases that we hadn't seen in the area.We would also like to neuter the dogs in some way - either surgically or with a newly developed vaccine. This would reduce the number of new dogs entering the area."
Belinda Wright, eminent leader for Asia's wildlife conservation and Executive Director, Wildlife Protection Society of India in her response says, "There are many government
departments and projects that this could come under, and NGOs working on animal
welfare issues … There must be someone out there who can make it happen".
Considering the fact that most of the organisations working with wildlife face a universal funding problem and are too busy combating poaching and habitat destruction to add disease threat to their list, irrespective of whether they think it is a problem, this and issues such as these have to be a COLLECTIVE approach.
To start with one solution that Olivia suggests is: "The one thing that would be good is to ensure that all rabies vaccination clinics are vaccinating against distemper at the same time. If you are able to help in that direction, that would be a start!
We are a small charity that provides expertise to organisations already working on the ground.
We aren't working much in India at the moment but have entered into discussion with Wildlife Institute of India."
Now at a time when a faraway small charity organisation that cares for Indian Tigers has reached out to the Wildlife Institute of India, isn't there something positive that collectively Indian charity organisations working both for wildlife and urban animals can do?
What about approaching NTCA (National Tiger Conservation Authority) and suggesting that they seek advice from WVI on how to tackle this problem?
What about the Wildlife NGOs and wildlife biologists coordinating with the WII to figure out how best they could contribute on this?
What about approaching the AWBI (Animal Welfare Board of India) and suggesting that they generate funds for massive vaccination drive and include homeless animals of wild areas in their policy as well?
There is a lot this country can do than just dance to the tunes of a handful of misguided short cut, knee jerk solution savvy conservationists who have announced a WAR on these homeless (feral) animals by propagating their CULL which is being allegedly on in large numbers.
I appeal to all those concerned, act together and use the beautiful mind that each one has been blessed with and you certainly shall find solutions.
