The mounting anger against stray dogs in Kerala after the death of a 90-year old man mauled by canines is evident in the various drives initiated by citizens.
Weeks after beginning the sale of air guns at subsidised rates to kill stray dogs, a Pala-based organization has now announced “prizes” to panchayat presidents for killing stray dogs.
Old Students Welfare Association of St Thomas College in Kottayam district announced their new “project” on Friday.
“Those panchayat presidents who lead killing of maximum number of stray dogs will be rewarded with gold coins from our side. They have a month’s time to win and get the gold coin,” declares secretary James Pambaykkal while speaking to The News Minute.
Top 10 panchayat presidents will be eligible for receiving gold coins.
The last day of the “project” is on November 30, when the “results” will be announced, after which the prize giving ceremony would be conducted.
James maintains that the group will consider only the number of dog killings since the date of announcement of the project.
“Even though dog killings were organized in some panchayats earlier, they were not conducted in a wide scale. So, we won’t consider those,” James says.
The association has also demanded that panchayat presidents submit a date-wise list of the number of dogs they kill during the course of the month. A minimum limit of killing 25 dogs have also been set.
Saying that such initiatives are the need of the hour as the government is “feigning ignorance” to the stray dog menace, James accuses the authorities of corruption in implementing the ABC programme in the state.
“All the funds being allotted for sterilization of stray dogs directly lands up in these officials’ pockets,” James claims.
James says that the success of the air gun distributing project the association spearheaded earlier this month led them to introducing project 2.
“We are still getting enquiries and have 200 pending orders,” he claims. James rues about the difficulty in being able to arrange enough number of air guns according to the demand.