Panchayat relocates stray dogs before Xi visit: Activists

“They are clearing the entire stretch of ECR because Prime Minister Narendra Modi will be using that road to reach Mahabalipuram. All dogs and cattle are to be removed to present a clean city. They cannot remove the cattle because most of them are owned by people. Whereas stray dogs are not anybody’s property and they are being removed. Nobody knows what will happen to these dogs after the relocation. No one has given any reassurance about the safety of these animals,” said Elaine Philpott, a veterinary nurse, Blue Cross of India.

“Many of them have already been vaccinated and sterilised. But the panchayat is making a false promise to capture them for birth control surgery. We don’t know what is going to happen to them. They have not given any information about the dogs and where they will be relocated to. There is no reason to capture these dogs which are already sterilised,” she added.

Volunteers added that numerous trips to the police station have not resulted in a positive response or any reassurance about the dogs. “There is no law to remove animals from an area if VVIPs are visiting. There is no guarantee that they will be put in a shelter, and fed on time,” said Neha Banyal, an animal activist.