This is the story of a Puppy, who was born less than a year ago in the car park of my apartment. He had another 4 siblings to compete with for food, space and mamma's attention amidst a 'not so friendly' human population. However, he and one his sister managed to survive the odds. He was one healthy guy, always full of joy. He jumped all over me, when he saw me, sharing a bit of his joy with me and even a 10 minute petting session wouldn't be enough to satisfy him. He just wanted more of my affection and nothing else.
He had soulful eyes that dreamt of nothing more than shade to sleep in and a little peaceful foraging time. Every evening, he would be out on the road with his parents and sister and the way he would sleep through the day was evidence to the many adventures that he was part of, the previous night.
He had his little place in the world or so it seemed till one day he disappeared. I worried endlessly for him till someone told me the corporation van had come and picked up the dogs of the area. I knew he would be operated upon, vaccinated against rabies and brought back. A week later, sure enough he was back and I was overjoyed. But he had changed, he had gone all quiet, like he had grown overnight. The trauma of being caught,(as my husband kept reminding me that he was caught in the first place because I was friendly with him and so he didn't keep away from humans the way his parents do.) of being kept with the other howling and terrified dogs in confined space and then being operated upon, all at a tender age with no known face around for comfort, I am surprised he survived at all.
After about 20 days after the surgery, he had a runny nose. I was worried he was coming down with a fever. Many days I forced him to drink milk and eat at home and hoped he would recover. We were not around for a week and when we came back, he wasn't around. We looked around for him in the area and hoped he would come back. The third day after our our return, he returned too. He was very weak and could barely open his eyes, but still he had found the strength to come back to the humans who were kind to him. We took him the hospital where the doctor said he probably had distemper (preventable but not curable)and would have to be 'put down'.The Doctor explained that it was most likely that he had picked up the disease at the NGO where he had been operated upon.
If distemper was rampant at the place where he was operated, why wasn't he given an Anti-distemper along with the Anti-rabies? Because the corporation didn't pay for that? Because the law does not explicitly specify it to be given? Because he wasn't someone's pet and having done their job of ABC-ARV, nobody cared if he survived or died?
Isn't the whole purpose of Animal Birth control(ABC) and ARV (Anti-rabies vaccination) is to humanly control the number of dogs and the cases of rabies. I always thought ABC was to control the population of dogs so the existing dogs could have a better quality of life, how naive of me? or didn't they deserve that dignity in their lives? is the concept of dignity to be applied to humans alone? if so, who gave us the right to make a decision on behalf of the animals? ABC in itself is a decision that we are making of that which is of no business of ours.
Coming back to the puppy, he got a little better with the medication and food. We started to feel optimistic that he was not down with distemper and would eventually make a full recovery. But, 5 days later, the twitching of the head muscles started, confirming distemper. It was very distressing to watch him, the bundle of joy was reduced to a pile of twitching bones. We took care of the puppy, gave him the comforts of home-affection, peace and food. I am not sure how much he suffered, he never complained, never cried, never asked for anything, even when we forced him to stay in-doors when all he wanted was to sleep in the open. We finally let him have his way and allowed him to sleep in the open, constantly keeping an eye on him. To cut the long story short, I left him as he was sleeping in the shade of a tree in the road and 5 minutes later, he was nowhere to be seen. This was 5 days ago and he is still missing, I just hope he had a swift and peaceful death.
This puppy survived against all odds. Eventually, he went down as a 'number' in the corporation's 'dogs caught' register, as a dog which was sterilised over the operating table of the NGO and as another dog whose life was cut short as I watched helplessly. His life was over even as it had begun.
And for this one puppy whose story has been told, there are thousands out there dying of the same fate because we who make decisions for them just don't care enough.
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