Noted Indian journalist comments on Maoist threat to street dogs and elephants in Bengal

[Guest guest]

Dear ,

 

Have a look at my column in the op-ed page of The Pioneer today.

 

Regards

Hiranmay Karlekar

 

http://www.dailypioneer.com/OPED/oped.html

**

*OPED* | Thursday, March 18, 2010 | Email <javascript:void();> |

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*Criminal streak*

 

*Hiranmay Karlekar*

 

*Killing of stray dogs reflects the ultimate form of sadism *

 

What is there in common among some Maoists committed to a violent overthrow

of the existing state, some bureaucrats sworn to uphold the Constitution of

India and the rule of law, and some presidents of Residents’ Welfare

Organisations? The answer is simple: The killing of stray dogs — or the

ordering of their killing — which is prohibited by law. The Animal Birth

Control (Dog) Rules 2001, promulgated under the Prevention of Cruelty to

Animals Act of 1960, only allow for the removal of stray dogs for neutering

and vaccination against rabies and their subsequent return to where they had

been taken from. The Guidelines for Dog Population Management, issued in

1990 by the World Health Organisation and the World Society for the

Protection of Animals, and several other WHO reports, make it clear that

this is the only scientific way of reducing the population of stray dogs.

 

The logic of the animal birth control programme is that dogs, being

territorial, prevent other dogs from entering their domains. Neutered and

vaccinated stray dogs prevent un-neutered and un-vaccinated dogs from other

areas from entering their territories. Hence, having neutered dogs in one

area, those administering the ABC programme can move into another and repeat

the performance. In this manner, an entire city, State or country is covered

and the number of stray dogs declines steeply as each of them lives out its

biological span of life. Then why the killing?

 

In the case of Maoists, it is a part of their war against the state. The

barking of stray and pet dogs warns police pickets and villagers of their

presence; surprise attacks are foiled and arrests facilitated. They are not

alone in this. Terrorists in Punjab and those sent across the Line of

Control in Jammu & Kashmir by Pakistani terrorist outfits like

Lashkar-e-Tayyeba, Hizbul Mujahideen and Jaish-e-Mohammad, had asked locals

to kill all dogs in their respective villages. Significantly, Mr Swaranjit

Sen, when he was the Director-General of Police in Andhra Pradesh, had asked

all police stations to adopt local stray dogs who would alert them to the

approach of Maoists at night.

 

To Maoists, the killing of stray and pet dogs is a part of the collateral

damages of war, which affects innocent people as well. There is a measure of

truth in this. According to a report, a herd of 80 elephants is in dire

straits in south Bengal as their return to their habitat is prevented by the

presence of Maoists and security forces in the forests through which they

have to pass. In *All Quiet on the Western Front,* Erich Maria Remarque

gives a heart-rending account of the agony of horses wounded in World War

First. The issue with Maoists is the deeper one of violence as an instrument

of capturing power, which is unjustified in a country where parliamentary

institutions for peaceful change in Governments exist and where even

revolutionary changes in socio-economic relations can be wrought through

constitutional amendments. As the results of the French, the Bolshevik and

Chinese revolutions indicate, revolutions devour their children and seldom

achieve their goals.

 

The problem with civil servants, particularly heads of municipalities who

are aware of the law but still order the killing of stray do, is different.

They display an utter contempt for the Constitution and an arrogance whose

effects are felt in arbitrary and savage actions in other fields as well. If

this makes them unsuited to holding high offices involving the exercise of a

significant measure of power, their actions and the demand for killing of

stray dogs by heads of RWA, also displays a genocidal streak. In his seminal

work, *Fear of Freedom, *Erich Fromm shows how sadism reflects a desire to

overcome one’s own feeling of insecurity through domination over others. The

most complete form of domination is over life itself which is realized

through an act of killing. Genocide is the most grotesque expression of

sadism. Since a call for the mass killing of a religious community or an

ethnic group will immediately fetch mass opprobrium, a substitute is sought

in the killing — or ordering the killing — of stray dogs. Hence we return to

the question: Can people calling for it be entrusted with offices of power?