SDMC goes for canine control drive; rounds up 41 dogs

A day after the death of a 7-year-old boy in south Delhi after being attacked by a pack of street dogs, SDMC today undertook a canine control drive and rounded up over 40 dogs from the area for sterilisation.
The incident had taken place in Jamia Nagar yesterday, and SDMC said that "such a case we have never heard before." Jamia Nagar falls in the Central Zone of the South Delhi Municipal Corporation.
South Delhi Mayor Subhash Arya said, the corporation is taking all measures to ward off street dog menace, but it has its own constraints.
"Today we went on dog-catching drive in our Central Zone and rounded up 41 of them. We faced resistance from local people, who feed them, and therefore we had to take help of police," Arya told PTI.

The Mayor said that in last one year SDMC has caught 13,036 dogs from the Central Zone for sterilisation.
"The dogs captured by our team today will be sterilised and then we will decide on future course of action," he said.

Arya said SDMC conducts regular sterilisation drive for such dogs and "it was unfortunate what happened with the boy yesterday."
On compensation to the family of the victim, he said, "we are yet to decide on that, as we are waiting for the report on the incident."
Meanwhile, observing that stray dog bites are a menace, the Delhi High Court today directed municipal bodies in the city to give detailed status report on how the rules for controlling the stray dog population were being implemented by them.

A senior SDMC official said, "In last three months, around 3,500 dogs have been sterilised as we try to keep a check on any infection that may arise out of them."
The SDMC takes help of NGOs and hires agencies to carry out works related to street dog control, from catching to sterilising to release them back again.
Police said that Mahmoon Ansari, a resident of Noor Nagar locality of Jamia Nagar area was attacked by dogs while playing with other kids on the sand dunes of Yamuna river bank, when he came before a pack of stray dogs there.

The boy was rushed to a private hospital in New Friends Colony where he succumbed to his grievous injuries during treatment.
Arya said, the corporation is currently also "fighting a case in court to build its own veterinary hospital, where sterilisation could be carried out.
"Currently, we take help of NGOs to do the job and it costs us Rs 2 crore annually," he said.