: Macabre death of Hyderabad child moves authorities to act on strays #IndiaNEWS #Social <br>The helpless child being surrounded by strays, pouncing on him and biting him all over the body leading

Macabre death of Hyderabad child moves authorities to act on strays #IndiaNEWS #Social
<br>The helpless child being surrounded by strays, pouncing on him and biting him all over the body leading to his death, has highlighted how serious the menace is in the city.
The shocking incident evoked public outrage, triggered a debate on how to check the dog menace and the usual man versus dog argument.
The municipal authorities came out with a new set of guidelines to control the stray population, not just in Hyderabad, but in other urban areas of the state as well.
A series of incidents of dog bites have been reported from different parts of the state over the last one week, putting spotlight on the problem.
The death of Pradeep on February 19 was the second such incident in Hyderabad in less than a year.
In April 2022, stray dogs had mauled to death a two-year-old boy in the Bada Bazar area of Golconda. Anas Ahmed, who was playing outside his house, was attacked by a pack of dogs which dragged him to an adjoining military area. The toddler had sustained grievous injuries and died before he could be taken to the hospital.
Disturbing CCTV visuals of the hapless child being attacked and dragged by dogs into the bushes had surfaced on social media.
The incident had triggered public outrage in the area. The dog catching teams were pressed into service in the immediate aftermath of the incident, but the problem was forgotten within a few days of the incident.
It took the death of another innocent for the municipal authorities to wake up. This time, the Greater Hyderabad Municipal Corporation (GHMC) announced some measures to check the menace after criticism from various quarters.
Taking cognisance of the media reports on the latest incident, the Telangana High Court initiated a suo moto PIL.
A division bench headed by Chief Justice Ujjal Bhuyan blamed the negligence by the GHMC for the boys death and asked it what steps are being taken to curtail incidents of stray dog attacks.
The court asked GHMC to explain what steps it would take to ensure that such an incident is not repeated.
Telangana had recorded 80,281 cases of dog bites in 2022, a huge leap from 24,000 in 2021. However, the municipal officials say the comparison would be incorrect as 2021 was a pandemic year when there was lesser animal-human conflict.
According to officials, 1. 6 lakh dog bite cases were registered in 2019 and compared to pre-Covid years, the cases have come down by 50 per cent. Telangana stands eighth in the country in terms of dog bite cases.
After the latest incident, the GHMC officials revealed that the Telangana capital has 5. 50 lakh stray dogs. According to the officials, this figure was 8. 50 lakh in 2011 but their population reduced with the successful Animal Birth Control-cum-Anti Rabies (ABC-AR) programme.