02 December,2010 06:30 AM IST | | Varun Singh
Cong corporator asks how BMC claims to have sterilised nearly a lakh strays, when there were just 75,000 strays in the city in 2007
With crores being spent on the sterilisation of stray dogs in the city and BMC figures pointing to an increase in their number instead of a decrease, questions are being raised on the efficacy of the process as well as the way it is being monitored.
MiD DAY had recently carried a series of reports exposing the various lacunae in the sterilisation programme.
BMC officials take a stray to a dog shelter in Deonar, Govandi, for sterilisation
Figures obtained from the BMC state that there were 74,926 strays in the city in 2007. However, the number of dogs sterilised by NGOs between 2008 and October, 2010, is 99,957.
This means that, even if you count only the number of dogs sterilised, stray population in the city has actually increased by a whopping nearly 33 per cent.
"The figures prove that there has been negligence on the part of the civic authorities. They have failed to monitor the sterilisation programme. They need to give an explanation to the people.
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Have stray dogs, too, been migrating to the city from other states?" asked Congress Corporator Rajendra Choube.
"If the sterilisation process is being carried out, the number has to drop, not go up.
But, figures point to a nearly one-third increase in stray population over three years and if that is so, there is something wrong with the sterilisation process," said Dr Manu Sharma from the Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals.
Sharma said that if close to one lakh dogs have been sterilised and there were, officially, nearly 74,000 dogs in the year 2007, that could mean that even the newborns have been sterilised.
"A dog can be sterilised only after it crosses the age of 8-9 months, be it male or female," she said.
62,000
Number of puppies that a pair of unsterilised dogs and their offspring could produce over a period of six years
The Other Side
G T Ambe, executive health officer, BMC said, "The figures must have gone up because dogs reproduce twice a year and each litter can have as many as eight to 10 puppies."
Number crunching
The sterilisation programme cost the state exchequer Rs 2.67 crore in the 2008 fiscal and Rs 2.54 crore in
the 2009 fiscal.
33,021 dogs were sterilised in 2008, 36,990 in 2009 and 29,946 till October 31, 2010.
