Lucknow: Three children, aged between 10 and 12 years, have been mauled to death by stray dogs in Sitapur district in the last 24 hours.
Ironically, the state and district administration has so far made no efforts to capture these stray dogs which have killed as many as nine children in the past four months in Sitapur district, just 90 km from the state capital Lucknow.
On Tuesday, a herd of stray dogs killed three children one by one. The first incident was reported from Tikaria village when a few children had gone to collect felled raw mangos from an orchard. They were chased by a herd of ferocious stray dogs. While other children ran away, dogs attacked Shamli (11).
On hearing her shrieks, a few villagers ran to save her but by that time dogs had bitten her stomach and face so badly that she died on the spot due to excessive bleeding and internal injuries.
The same herd of stray dogs then attacked Khaild (12) in nearby Gurpalia village. They ate half of Khalid’s body before the villagers could shoo them away. Komal (10) became third victim of stray dogs when they chased a guard and attacked children in Kolia village. While the guard and others climbed to mango trees, they pulled Komal down by grabbing her leg in their jaws when she tried to climb the tree to save her life.
Before the eyes of the guard and other children, dogs mutilated Komal with their strong jaws and ran away to their hide-out. “They would come in a herd, attack children, eat their bodies and run away,” said Ram Lakhan a villager in Kolia village. Villagers claimed the group of dogs operate within a stretch of 12 kms.
After the death of nine children in an attack of stray dogs in the past four months, villagers are up in arms against the local civic authorities and district administration. “We have lodged several complaints but no efforts have been made by the civic administration to send the dog squad to catch these ferocious dogs to save lives of our children,” fumed Saurabh Kumar.
Villagers are so scared that they have stopped sending their children out to play. The Forest department officials have washed off their hands from the stray dog menace saying that it does not come under their purview. The civic authorities said that they have no resources to press dog squad.
Interestingly, the local BJP MLA Rakesh Rathore had raised a question in this regard during the last session of the State Assembly but district administration has not taken any action so far against these start dogs killing children.
After the death of three children in a day, the SDM Sadar Shashank Tripathi said that they have formed four teams to catch these dogs. “We have sought help from private dog catchers to end the menace,” said he.