Tuesday, July 19, 2011

Time to STAND UP FOR BANGALORE STRAYS>> PUNE ANIMAL LOVERS WE HAVE A LONG BATTLE AHEAD OF US.. PLEASE READ ALONG

The Karnataka administration and the BBMP (Bangalore City Municipality)etc. are pressured by the residents of Bangalore to 'get rid of the stray dogs'. It is significant pressure, compounded by the media / press having a free run, and incited by a very well organized 'Stary Dog Free Bangalore' group,(RUN BY DIANA BHARUCHA) which is now a society with a plan of action etc.

We have to counter this big menace. The plan of action is to question the media's approach, and make them accountable and sensitive to the cause. And to show to the Karnataka and Bangalore administration that a lot of people are pro-animal. We realise that the numbers are not large enough from Bangalore city alone, and so the entire country's pro-animal people have to be mobilised. If we manage to pull this off, we can be a really strong power.
Round 1 of this plan is to give a logical, sensible petition to the media heads, while simultaneously writing / calling the Bangalore and Karnataka administration.
Round 2 would start once we get (or don't get) a response from the media people. We hope to have this petition finished with its signatures by end of July and handed to the media by August 1st week.
We think that if 1000 people were to write to the CM, that is a significant number, as there have been NO people from the opposite side writing to the CM! They have indirect pressure, through media et all. No citizens directly complaining about stray dogs to the CM. But here are a number of people writing PRO-dogs directly to the CM. The BBMP is willing to be reasonable, but the pressure on them has to stop. Right now they slyly instruct the NGOs to pick up 10 dogs and release only 4, and hold the 6 'for observation', as they claim. Most times no one knows what happens to those dogs. This nonsense has to stop. The BBMP also easily crumbles under pressure, as it feels no pro-animal body is making an equivalent effort. And we have to do our bit to build pro-animal pressure.
One of the residents is Diana Bharucha (founder of Stry Dog-Free Bangalore) a Parsi, which is a shame among our Zorastrian community. She is all for culling of stray dogs. She has instigated the press and media to publish wrong matter about Bangalore stray dogs.
One such article being a toddler-Sandeep mauled by a stray dog. It has been informed by very reliable sources that the cause of death of the toddler Sandeep is either a traffic accident, or some form of murder by HUMAN BEINGS, probably practitioner of some cult practices.
However, we are made to understand that the post mortem revealed 'animal bite' as cause of death. The post mortem report has not been handed to us. Several independent experts have been consulted by us outside of the country, and looking at the picture, they say that the cuts seem very precise, and not those of an animal's teeth.
And what we absolutely must do is dissuade the press from reporting such stories, create pressure on the Karnataka government, and continue to get the signatures on the petition.

ATTACHED DOC ARE DIANA'S VIEWS PUBLISHED IN TIMES OF INDIA(pls enlarge to read it)
DIANA BHARUCHA - founder of the NGO Stray Dog-Free Bangalore
(http://indiabest.blogspot.com/) (Diana's welfare status)
The HAL 3rd Stage Tax Payers and Residents' Association# 543, 6th 'A' Cross, 10th Main, (Ph: 2529-895 Ph: 2552-0350 / 2553-4521) email :dianacyrus@vsnl.net (Mobile 98804 33711)
The bite of an animal lover is far more painful than the bite of an animal. And I am 100% sure there are some die hard animal lovers among the ZORASTRIAN COMMUNITY who will have a polite and firm chat with DIANA BHARUCHA to stop this ridiculous crusade against the stray dogs of Bangalore.
Please come forward and help us make Diana realise what she is doing is very very wrong and sinful. We have no right to take anyone's life!
Kindly sign the petition put forward by all animal lovers against the culling of Bangalore street dogs.
Click on this link and sign the petition and spread it amongst your friends. The verdict will be out on 08Aug11. We need maximum support !
Here are the contact details of the concerned officials:
B.S. Yediyurappa, Chief Minister 080 22253414 and 22253424 & 2225580
Email: cm@kar.nic.in
Mark the mail to the following:
BBMP contacts:

Commissioner: comm@bbmp.gov.in
Joint Director Animal Husbandory: jdanihus@bbmp.gov.in
Further to my note, for all those who believe that stray dogs are a threat to society...
Dogs attack only when provoked, say experts

Dogs sense fear in people’s mind and chase when they run, only to scare them further

Manasi Paresh Kumar manasi.pk@timesgroup.com
“The majority of the attacks that have happened in the past few days were because of territorial aggression. A dog is primarily a watch animal whose first instinct is protection. The reasoning that dog are getting more aggressive because they have access to meat from illegal meat shops is flawed. Dogs don’t get ferocious because they eat meat. They are ferocious because they are protecting their territory where food is available. Provoke them in any such situation, and the aggression is quite high,” says Yethiraj, adding that this is also the reason behind dogs chasing motorists after dark, when their protective instincts are heightened. "


The Love of Animals and the Holiness of the Dog In Zoroastrianism

"A man who kills one shall abide in hell for nine generations"-Zoroaster

In today’s Iran, some ruling clergy teach that the love of animals, and especially fondness for dogs is a decadent, western value. Unfortunately , stray dogs are killed and abused. My purpose in this article is to show that that the love of pets/dogs is an ancient, revered tradition of the original iranians; an ancient virtue and a common indo-european value that must be honored.

Ehtirám-i sag; or “great respect for the dog;” is a command among Zoroastrians. In Zoroastrianism, the dog is regarded as an especially benevolent, and virtuous creature, which must be fed and lovingly taken care of. The dog is praised for loyalty, intelligence and having special spiritual virtues.

Dogs receive a striking degree of attention in the “legal” (dâtîc) books of the Avesta, notably in the “Vi-dêv-dâd” and the “Dvâsrôb” or the 16th Nask/Volume of the Avesta, the contents of which are known from Dênkart (q.v.) 8. Detailed prescriptions for the appropriate treatment of dogs are found in the Vi-dêv-dâd (one of the legal Avestan scriptures), especially in chapters 13, 14 and 15, where the faithful are required to assist dogs, both domestic and stray, in various ways. Help or harm to a dog is equated with help and harm to a human. Responsibility toward dogs is repeatedly linked with responsibility toward humans.

In the Hüspârâm Nask the proper quantities of food are listed for man, woman, child, and the three kinds of dogs (Dênkart 8.37.1).
In Vi-dêv-dâd 13.28 it is enjoined that a dog is to be given whole milk, hearty bread and other dairy products, staple articles of the diet of farmers.

In Sad-dar/hundred doors 31.1 it is enjoined that “whenever people eat, they should keep back three morsels from themselves and give them to a dog or pet,” and this was general practice in the Irani and Parsi communities down into the present century (Boyce, Stronghold, pp. 143, 145 n. 11). It is also a major sin if a man harms a dog by giving it bones that are too hard and become stuck in its throat, or food that is too hot, so that it burns dog’s throat. Giving bad food to a dog is as bad as serving bad food to a righteous human.

A sick dog or animal is to be looked after as carefully as a sick person (Vi-dêv-dâd. 13.35) A homeowner is required to take care of a pregnant dog that lies near his/her home until the puppies are six months old (Vi-dêv-dâd. 15.45.) If the homeowner does not help the dog and the puppies come to harm as a result, “he/she shall pay for it the penalty for wilful murder;” because the Spiritual Blaze/Fire of GD watches over a pregnant dog as it does over a mortal woman” (Vi-dêv-dâd. 15.19.). The believers are required to take care of a dog with a damaged sense of smell, to try to heal the dog, “in the same manner as they would do for one of the faithful.”

The killing of a dog is considered to lead to damnation and extreme evil luck.
According to Vi-dêv-dâd and in traditional Zoroastrian practice, dogs are allotted funerary rites analogous to humans. one of the places where earth suffers most is where the bodies of men and dogs are buried (Vi-dêv-dâd. 3.8). If a dog dies in a house, fire/flame is to be taken out of that house, as when a human dies (Vi-dêv-dâd. 5.39-40), and the dog’s body is to be carried like a human to a place of exposure to the elements (Vi-dêv-dâd 8.14).

A dog’s gaze is considered to be purifying and to drive off daävás (demonic powers) and Nasü; the demon of rot, decay and nought. sag-did or literally “dog’s sight,” is a Persian/Zoroastrian term, and refers to a funeral practice in which a dog is brought into where the deceased is laid, so that the dog can “cast gaze” on the dead. There are various spiritual benefits thought to be obtained by the ceremony. It is believed that the original purpose was to make certain that the person was really dead, since the dog’s more acute senses would be able to detect signs of life that a human might miss. A “four-eyed” dog, that is one with two spots on its forehead, is preferred for sag-did. The dog used for this task is ideally “brownish-golden with four eyes/two flecks of different-colored hairs just above the eyes; with golden ears” (zairitəm chathrü chashməm, spaätəm zairi.gaöshəm; Vi-dêv-dâd. 8.16).

In Vi-dêv-dâd 19.30 two dogs are said to stand at the chinvat/illumination bridge, by the female figure of Daäná/insight, who there addressess the soul, and in Vi-dêv-dâd 13.9 these are called the “passage-protecting or pəšü.pâna dogs or spâna.”

In Zoroastrianism, dogs/pets are fed in commemoration of the deceased person. A portion of the food offerings for the deceased is always given to a dog or pet (Boyce, Stronghold, pp. 143-44, 158; Modi, pp. 404, 350). During the three days after death, if there are no house dog/pets, a stray is given food for the soul’s sake at every mealtime, and then, in Zoroastrian villages of Iran, once a day outside the house for the next thirty to forty days (Boyce, Stronghold, pp. 153 and n. 30, 158).
Bibliography:

M. Boyce, Zoroastrianism. Its Antiquity and Constant Vigour, Columbia Iranian Series 7, Costa Mesa, Calif., 1992.

A. V. W. Jackson, Persia Past and Present, New York, 1909; repr. New York, 1975. A. V. W. Jackson, Persia Past and Present, New York, 1909; repr. New York, 1975.

Pahlavi Vendidâd, tr. B. T. Anklesaria, Bombay, 1949.

B. Schlerath, “Der Hund bei den Indo-germanen,” Paideuma 6, 1954, pp. 25-40.
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The first riots in Mumbai were by the Parsees in British India when the British ordered the culling of street dogs. The Parsees first protested then rioted and the British agreed the dogs could stay.
Now I understand why Fali S Nariman defended the 3 lakh dogs ordered to be killed by the BMC at the Supreme Court and got a reprieve for them.
(link on -Lawyers defending to the culling of street dogs by Fali S Nariman)
As a society, we can evolve only when we treat all living beings with respect and a have a total absence of of double-standards. If the murder of a human is wrong, then, by any truly moral society's standards, the murder of animals or any other being should be morally repugnant as well. We need to accept that animals are rightful inhabitants of this planet as well and we have to start living in harmony with them rather than without them.
Only when we realise and embrace our co-existence can peace - true peace come about. Any act of violence will only give rise to more violence and therefore, we must only choose humane, peaceful solutions to all our issues - jointly, sanely, peacefully and most importantly - respectfully.

"We cannot have peace among men whose hearts find delight in killing any living creature." - Rachel Carson, American Author and Marine Biologist
So friends please take time out to sign the petition, write to the Chief Minister and condemn Diana Bharucha's actions. Please circulate this mail to as many as possible, the dead line is 08Aug2011.
FROM ALL THE ANIMAL LOVERS AROUND THE WORLD.