INTROSPECTION
Lovely readers,
Good day.
This is Sameen, a fellow Earthling1 whose name you might have seen in Us Magazine before.
And as you may or may not have noticed yet, I have taken over today’s issue of the magazine. Apologies!
Let me explain.
But before that, let me warn you, the rest of this piece is a bit of a downer. Tears are likely to be shed at some point. So grab a box of tissues, have a seat, make yourselves comfortable. Now hand me the box of tissues because I am going to need it.
Take a look at these photos. This is Rocket, a beautiful four-legged bundle of awesomeness. I first met him a few months ago - in the second half of last year - when I found him walking around, all alone, in my neighbourhood. I gave him some milk and bread, and that’s how we became friends. He quickly became very popular and much loved in my family. Whenever he showed up - which was almost every day - we’d feed him, talk to him, dote over him, and sometimes let him inside to rest in the porch. He was smart, gentle, and very friendly, and his effortless adorableness always left us uplifted. We talked about letting him stay inside more often (if we could teach him to get along with our many stray cats) and he was on his way to having a permanent home with us2, but that wasn’t to be.
On 14th March, we heard a gunshot. Rocket, we would soon find out, had been shot and killed. And so had most of his canine friends.
I had heard of the culling of stray dogs numerous times before, and it had always broken my heart. But I had been told it didn’t happen here, not in our town. Our people weren’t that brutal, and if there was ever an issue, our strays were just nicely, humanely relocated to some magical farm where they lived happily ever after. Of course I didn’t entirely believe that, but surely the authorities wouldn’t just suddenly, randomly shoot all the dogs?
Yes they would.
Just thinking of culling is upsetting for any animal lover; experiencing it first hand is just plain excruciating.
What could possibly make it even more excruciating? Finding three lovely dogs (who looked very similar to Rocket) outside the house the next morning and not knowing what to do.
A guard told us that a man had been called in to shoot the dogs, and the guard himself seemed upset about the decision. “It’s such a sin to shoot animals like this, it’s such a sin to shoot cats and dogs,” he kept repeating. “Bohat gunna hai, bohat gunna hai.”
So were we going to hear three more gunshots that day? We couldn’t just sit idly by and let that happen. But what could we do?
“Contact NGOs,” someone suggested, and a lot of frantic googling later, we found the links to a few animal welfare organizations that helped stray animals. Todd’s Welfare Society (TWS) agreed to help by relocating the dogs (for a fee of Rs.1000 which one of my friends generously donated immediately). Their team showed up twice - on Thursday night and Saturday night - and despite their best efforts were unable to catch the dogs (who it turned out were the parents of lovely little pups). They simply weren’t trained for the job, they said; they were just volunteers. They did, however, manage to convince the authorities to stop the culling (for now) and next time to give them a call and to help them relocate the dogs instead of killing them mercilessly.
Of course this isn’t a permanent solution and it leaves the ultimate fate of the dogs in limbo. So what is a better, long-term solution? I tried to find out, and the nice folks at Us Mag were kind enough to allow me to tell you all about it.
To find out about humane stray control strategies, I asked a number of veterinarians, including some who have worked on projects to rescue stray dogs; you can read what they had to say on page 11.
Fortunately a lot of people are trying to do something about this issue. You can read the interviews of three such efforts - TWS in Lahore (page 8-10), Save Our Strays in Karachi (page 12), and People’s Animal Care Trust in Rawalpindi (page 13) - in today’s issue of Us. There are, of course, many more animal welfare initiatives in this country; we hope we will be able to tell you about their efforts, too, in the future.
We have also asked celebrities their views on animal rights and welfare (page 6-7). We admire these people for their talents, and they clearly admire animals for all the benefits and love they provide.
In the next few pages, you will hear from a lot of people who will implore you to love animals, not fear them; to try and help them, not shoot or poison them to death. Several experts have explained why culling does not solve anything; it just leaves you tapped in an endless cycle of brutality. Please pay heed to their words.
Nature is magical. Everything has its place in this world, and we all need to coexist in harmony. Being the dominant species gives us power. And with great power, superheroes keep telling us, comes great responsibility. It is our responsibility to help the creatures around us, not crush them.
While I may not know much, I am fairly certain of the fact that God did not create dogs so that psychopaths could use them for shooting practice.
Please help bring culling to an end. Help any animals you can. Raise awareness about their plight. Teach children to care. Don’t let your fear or inconvenience be the death sentence for another living creature. And if you have genuine concerns about any animals, please do not ask your authorities to shoot or poison them; specify that you don’t condone needless violence - ask for humane solutions instead.
Embrace love.
And if you can’t do anything else, then just do one thing: be kind. Please be kind.
1 (unless you’re from a different planet, in which case ... hope you’re having better luck than we are)
2 A friend abroad had even sent a collar for him. It hasn’t arrived yet. You do not want to speak to me the day it does.
