Sir

I come across many news daily, maybe because of being a media student. In the crowd of all news that I read, the news that piques me the most are of animal abuse. And I hardly come across a news headline like “a dog killed by a speeding car or bike”. I am raising this issue because I have seen people killed in road accidents and I have also seen animals being killed in road accidents more often. At least each month I see one or two animals died on the road.

In 2016 the Supreme Court said, “an impression should not be created that human life has lesser value than that of a dog, and stressed that stray dogs can be killed only in accordance with the Animal Birth Control Rules”. How it would have been with “an impression should not be created that human life has lesser value than that of a dog neither that animal life has any less value than that of human”?Things should be made strictly clear to the stubborn heads of people doing Animal Abuse. 

Now we all have seen if a human meets an accident, a crowd automatically gathers around the dead body as if the body is a magnet. I do not discourage this; in fact it is good that people are still considerate enough to care for another human. But what happens when there is an animal body? Why people suddenly become blind? My mother had always told me to say “OM NAMAH SHIVAY” whenever I see something as dirty as an animal’s dead body. I simply want to ask people that can we do something more humane than this in such cases.

I am an animal lover. I feed 6 stray dogs of my colony, daily. I know it is not enough but I have just started. On 4^th June, I read an undercover investigation report by Animal Recovery Mission working in USA. This investigation was on cruelty against cows in the Fair Oaks Farms and Coca Cola located in Indiana, USA (https://animalrecoverymission.org/operations/factory-farm-division/operation-fair-oaks-farms-dairy-adventure/ )  The video made in this report is showing the cruelty against the cows and it is really disturbing.

One incident, happened some days back made me think more on this issue. I was travelling in auto, on one side of the road a dog was lying dead in a road accident. And on the other side two people were in a fight and about 10 people were standing there to watch the fight.

It forced me to think upon the statement given by the Supreme Court.  Laws have been made to safeguard the rights and lives of people who have always been dominated by powerful people. Reservation bill has been passed to uplift the people of lower caste and economic status.  Paris Agreement was done to protect our environment and balancing the imbalanced ecological system. And many such bills, agreements, summits, etc are introduced in order to protect something or other. As a human on this Earth, we are concerned towards those species who share same planet as us. So, why not something for animals has been initiated? Yes there are laws as “THE PREVENTION OF CRUELTY TO ANIMALS ACT, 1960”, “ANIMAL BIRTH CONTROL RULES, 2001”, etc and many NGOs are working for them.

But the ground does not get the benefits. I am used to listening to people saying “if you will do sin in this life, as a punishment the next life will be of an animal”. After seeing the pups, showing their rib cage, licking the blood from the sanitary pads thrown on the streets, eating grass which is not their natural food make me think that these people are right. The life of animals is actually is a punishment; some people say “a curse by god”.

TANYA TRIVEDI

  animals