East End Apartments in Mayur Vihar Phase I had earmarked four spots for stray feeding. But dogs are territorial, and seldom leave their areas.
In view of Delhi High Court guidelines that deemed feeding and taking care of area strays legal, the managing committee of East End Apartments in Mayur Vihar Phase I had earmarked four spots for stray feeding. But the plan hasn’t worked out as well as it should have.
Here’s why…
As reported in City Spidey on November 1, the idea of have feeding spots was executed with the assistance of some residents and under the supervision of an official associated with Animal Welfare Board of India (AWBI). The aim was to minimize stray-human conflict. The society has about 45 strays living within the premises. The committee had also made clear that dog feeders not complying with the guidelines would face punitive action.
Explaining why the whole plan failed to take off, BK Singh, president of the managing committee, said, “Dogs living in a particular area do not want to go out of their territory. A particular group belongs to a particular territory, and they get aggressive if another group enters that area. So dog feeders were facing difficulty to taking them out of their territory, where they had been living from several years. It is in dog’s nature to defend their area.”
The managing committee, therefore, had to step in. It set up a three-member committee of elected managing members — K Pasupathy, Aparesh Mukhopadhyay and S Sivaraman — to look into the issue, and look at alternative ways to deal with the strays.
Speaking to City Spidey, Pasupathy said, “With fixing feeding spots, we thought we would have a system in place that would ultimately reduce cases of dog bites, but clearly it did not work out. So, now we are taking other measures to contain the stray problem.”
As a first measure, the committee on Tuesday vaccinated as many 21 stray dogs with the help of dog feeders.
“At present, 45 stray dogs are living in the society — 17 were vaccinated some 15 days backs and 21 more on Tuesday. The remaining would be vaccinated in the next round. The vaccination is being done by a vet, and the expenses are being borne by the managing committee.”
The managing committee is also planning to put cattle guards at the society’s gates to prohibit the entry of more stray dogs. The idea is being discussed, but expenses are a concern. “We are discussing the proposal — whether the results will justify the cost. Hopefully, we would be able to take final decision on it soon. Around six years back, we had tried a sound ray system at the gates to discourage strays from entering. But it proved to be a failure,” S Sivaraman added.
To this, K Pasupathi added, “We have decided to invite AWBI official again to help us in finding some alternatives.”
