Bow-wow …The Rousing Barks!

Bow-wow!! Bow-wow!! As these barking sounds are reverberating endlessly in the Srinagar streets, the peril created by the voracious barkers is the only keyword enthralling the length and breadth of every news-daily in Kashmir. These four-legged canines that are considered faithful elsewhere, are giving a tough time for the poor two-legged riffraff commuters in Kashmir…shame on Greedy dogs. 

As an add-on to this ironically rueful happening I would like to share a jolly but heedful experience. A few days back I joyously started a dog count while riding the pillion on my brother’s bike. To my amazement I found a whooping count of over 700 dogs, only from Broadway to Soura SKIMS, a distance of not more than 10 Km thereby gauging the ratio to 70 dogs per Km, minus all those I missed. It was presenting the scenario of an indefinite curfew declared by the stray dogs. This naïve figure although a doodle should act a food for thought for the concerned authorities who are still catching Z’s in their rest rooms with their eyes shut, unaware of the dog spread that has already turned into a threat.

Freshly there have been myriad episodes in which the dog menace has crossed every possibility of tolerance by a sane mind. I feel it needless to mention all the bloodcurdling statistics caused by these life-threatening newsy ruffians that are already flooding as the news figures. Eye brows are being raised in this regard and thousands of questions are being fired where as finding a decent solution seems to be a far cry. Well cooked theories, opinions and agendas presenting various therapies, rehabilitations, and some hilarious pied piper stories have been drafted by the various sections as a remedy for this menace. All of them have successfully captivated the title of newsworthiness alas nothing seems to be operational in realism. I am sorry these ideas won’t bring any good to us unless we don’t start on our own.

A smart attempt in cracking this enigma will be scrutinizing the root-cause of this nuisance. And the main reason for the over population of stray dogs that clicks my wisdom is the mammoth heap of the garbage and rubbish that is engulfing the so called “beautiful Srinagar”. On the similar lines if we revisit the following great saying we may get a hint:

“Aangan e naad  chu karaan hoeen

Bayou mei kun tuih shin tou  

Yem ye wow teim tee loon

Hoon chuo dapaan wow wow wow”

This eye-opening stanza by Sheikh-ul-Alam (R.A) translates into following lines: 

 “The dogs in the yard are calling

Lo! Brothers lend me your ear

You reap what you sow

The dog says bow wow bow wow”

Well this was the opinion presented by a legendary long-headed mentor decades ago. The same message stands before us worth pondering with one single difference that dogs nowadays bark less and bite more. But the eye-opening revelation answers all the questions that have popped-up because of the present dog menace in Kashmir. The lines clearly elucidate the verity “You reap what you sow”. And surely yes the dog menace we are presently suffering from is the result of our own actions. So any other reason for this bungling gets underrated. It’s only us who ignorantly started throwing waste here and there, we transformed public places into garbage dumps, and it’s again us who murdered our environment by emptying our trash bins in our neighborhood. And consequently we invited these tail wagging creatures to breed and multiply in our lap.

Poisoning all the dogs may be a short term solution to get a good riddance and a good revenge too but we need to think in longer terms. And the only mantra that will work is keeping our surroundings clean. We need to understand the importance of proper sanitation and hygiene. At the same time the concerned authorities are expected to take proper actions and educate the masses about the same.

Verily God has created every form of life with a purpose and a proper balance must be maintained to make the process of nature spotless. The nature by no means acts against the human development. It’s only our ignorance and voraciousness that brings us at the receiving end. And this dog menace is a Frankenstein that we have invented by our own dirty hands and now we have to face the storm.

Lastly I hope my effort redrafts the opinion of this newsy doggy issue and I look forward for some rapid action. Else we need to cast another hope of Sheikh-ul-Alam (R.A) revising his opinion about dogs.

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