BENGALURU: Barely a week after the shocking incident of a stray dog being bludgeoned to death in the city came to light, four more stray dogs, including three pups, were killed by security guards at residential apartments in separate incidents across the city. A woman from the United States, who came to know about the killing of three puppies from her parents who live in the city, contacted an animal welfare organisation in the city and alerted them about the incident.
Animal welfare officer Harish K.B., who took up the case and started investigating, found that a builder in Lakshmisagara Road in Chandapura ordered the security guard to kill the puppies. The guard grabbed the pups, just a few days old, and smashed them on the road with his bare hands. One of the pups died instantly, while the other two suffered for hours before dying.
In another incident, three security guards of an apartment in HSR Layout brutally killed a stray dog by hitting it with an iron rod and wooden sticks. The gruesome act was captured on the apartment's CCTV camera with the incident taking place in broad daylight on July 10. The three guards chased and caught the dog and stuffed it into a gunny bag before hitting it repeatedly. Harish said that the apartment residents had complained over having sleepless nights because of the dog's barking and kept complaining to the guards about the nuisance posed by the stray.
Harish said that he filed a complaint with the HSR Layout police, who arrested the three. But they came out on bail soon after. He said, "The population of strays is increasing, but there are no care-takers who can adopt them. Also, the sterilisation programme has not been taken up extensively to control the population of stray dogs."
He said, "Strays attack only when they are taunted or when they are hungry. If people start feeding them and treating them properly, they'll guard the area and alert them when a stranger enters their road. People are keen on adopting dogs of foreign breeds, leaving behind the Indian breeds." Toni Freer, another city-based animal lover, said, "We need to educate people on how they should behave with stray dogs. We can't forcibly make people love dogs, but we can educate them."
