They say dogs have a way of finding us. Especially, the ones who are suffering. 

Last month, in my colony, a very badly injured dog found his humans. Just people of the colony coming together to help a dog in terrible pain. His right arm had a cut which had been left untreated and because of that it was infested with maggots. Just the worst thing that can happen to an injury. But to me and some other people in the colony it wasn’t the end of the road for him. We decided to help him in every way possible.

Because he wasn’t from this colony, and maybe because of the distress he was in, he kept moving from one location to another. So I along with some people who were taking care of him started coordinating for basic first aid to start with. We’d look for him everyday. Give him the medicines our local vet prescribed. Feed him. And do whatever we can to make him a little better. We knew this injury was going to take special confined care and treatment. So we even spoke to an NGO and they offered to help. They were going to come pick him up and take him for treatment.

But humanity took a deadly turn a day before he was going to visit the doctor.

A woman who claims to be an animal lover herself, got in touch with doctor over a call. Without any physical examination decided to have one of the helpers from the clinic come over and quietly, without informing, consulting any of the people who were taking care of him, euthanised him.

Just like that. Over text messages his fate was decided and sealed. He was killed. I have taken care of enough dogs. rescued enough dogs to know - this dog would have survived. He was walking around. He ate. He was fighting. 

I know people sometimes have to take that very difficult decision. And it breaks them. And I totally get it. But is there no protocol? No process? Would you just euthanise a dog because someone asked you to over WhatsApp, without any physical examination? Why? Because he was a stray dog whose pain was too difficult for this woman to take? Could she not have tried to help him first before taking a decision for him that she had no right to? Could she not have sat with him for a bit and comforted him instead? Called a vet to examine him? She took away his chance to survive and she absolutely had no right to do that. 

Are we becoming that intolerant towards pain? A dog is in pain so kill him? Even if the pain is temporary? Can doctors just send helpers with poison to kill dogs who are injured? What about the law? Can people do whatever they want in this country without worrying about the consequences because a stray's life has no value for them?

A lot of questions are unanswered but that’s not going to stop us from asking questions. We even lodged a complaint at the nearest Police station, just to be disappointed. We followed up twice physically but were dissed on the basis that the post mortem report we requested would take time. We had enough proof and the people involved accepted their crime thinking they had done nothing wrong but the police simply had no interest to help us. They said they won't lodge an FIR without the post mortem report.

We thought the Supreme Court had  announced "FIR as mandatory under Section 154 of the Code. After following up we wrote to the SHO, to the DCP, ACP and then went again to personally ask them why aren't they lodging our complaint. The SHO & ACP told us to wait for the report and refused to have a decent conversation with us or listen to anything we had to say. It's been over a month and still our FIR has not been registered, neither have we received the report. According to the law what they did was illegal but there were no consequences for their actions. None at all. Even though, we were able to find the body, we had a witness, the helper accepted that the doctor had guided him to do what he did, the woman shamelessly accepted her decision to end his life, we submitted the form with her signature authorizing the same. Are these not enough for an FIR?

This petition is mainly about four things:

1. FIR should be mandatory in cases involving animal law. 
2. FIR mandatory under Section 154 must be registered. 
3. An unbiased animal welfare officer should be involved in such cases where police refuses to take action (This should be recorded in the code)
4. The most important one is that this boy, whom we didn't know for long but named him Jawaan, deserves to be fought for. His life should not have gone in vein and this is the least we can do for him and for other animals who might be headed to a fateful end like him, where they feel relaxed and experience the pain disappearing and as they close their eyes with the hope and trust in the humans who they think are helping them, thinking they would feel better when they wake up, not knowing they won't open their eyes again.

 

Please sign the petition to support us in this fight to get justice for Jawaan.