determined to kill the dogs of Kandy

September 11, 2005

Yesterday the Chiefminister was sure that the Mayor had given an order to stop

the killing, today we learned from the news: a rabid dog was found in Kandy, he

had bitten a few people and after his death the head was sent for

rabies-verification and was found positive. This is what they were waiting for:

finally a rabies-case in town and a pretext to continue killing. After hearing

this I took a phone-call to Dr.Jayasinghe, we had a long discussion, but didn't

get anywhere. By the way he told me, that he is reading in fact all the e-mails,

which come to him and will reply all of them, and he told me today what he is

going to reply. For me it is futile to talk or write to him again, because he

knows the truth, he does not do the wrong thing out of ignorance. If someone

does not understand, there is a point in explaining and trying to convince, but

if someone's mind is set on a course for vested intrests, he does not even

listen, nor is he trying to understand. But as Champa said, he should know, that

many don't agree with the killing-policy and therefore feel free to write to

him: sarathjayasinghe21

More effective may be mails to the Nimal Siripala de Silva, the Minister for

Health because he at least has an intention to eliminate rabies with a

scientific humane method: postmaster

Maneka Gandhi is suggesting, that letters to the President and her son may also

have an impact, in her case we have to expect, that many secretaries screen the

letters, but if they get through to her, she may be attending, at least she may

ask the Governor of the Cental Province to look into it (that is what she did

last time we wrote to her), if many letters come, she may give more attention.

She is known to be kind to animals, but as the Chiefminister told me yesterday:

now everybody is busy with the election-campaign... and that will be so for the

next four months. Her son Vimukthi of course is more likely to take notice, if

time permits him (I heard he is having his final exams these days)... may be

Suzanne or Anousha can give us his address?

Apart from the letter-campaign, I have no idea now what we can do. Locally we'll

try to have a protest to draw some attention from the media before the hearing

in courts.

Rohini has updated the accounts of our continued struggle to keep this programme

going, which was not coming easy from the very beginning, you can read that

below. It's a long text, but therfore contains all the relevant facts:

History of the Kandy No-Kill-Programme

The Kandy no-kill-programme was offered by Dr. Jayasinghe (KMC-Vet.Surgeon)

through a newspaper article in October 2002

Mrs. Edith Zellweger from Switzerland, who happened to be a guest at my

residence at that time, decided to sponsor this no-kill-programme

The Mayor of Kandy Hon. Kesera Senenayaka and Dr. S.R Jayasinghe were contacted

through the Swiss Embassy and an appointment was given to Mrs. Zellweger and

myself to discuss the future of Gohagoda (pound, where the dogs seized used to

be killed) and the planned sterilization programmes.

The agreement was: to bring any dog found on the streets to Gohagoda dog pound,

to be sterilized and vaccinated there, registered, identified and then returned

to the place from which it was caught.

In addition to the Gohagoda programme, 24 KMC sterilization programmes were to

be carried every second Saturday in the community wards of Kandy.

End of October 2002 the keys to Gohagoda were handed over to us.

At the same time we arranged a free sterilization and vaccination programme with

the University Peradeniya Vet. Department.

During the workink-hours of the University clinic anybody can get his cat or dog

sterilized there free of charge and will get the vaccination and a red collar

free of charge (This programme still continues).

First we took the dogs from Gohagoda also to the University Peradeniya Vet.

Faculty for sterilizations, but soon realized, that it would be easier and more

cost effective to sterilize the dogs in Gohagoda.

When we suggested this, Dr. Jayasinghe informed us, that nobody else is

permitted to sterilize the dogs in Gohagoda but him! He did not want to come to

Gohagoda to perform the surgeries there, but suggested, that he will send the

dog-van every Saturday or Sunday to bring the dogs from Gohagoda to the KMC-lab

in his office. We did not like this additional stress-factor for the dogs (to be

transported in this horrible dog-van once again), but we had no choice than to

submit to his dictates.

We came to an agreement, that he will be paid 1200 Rs per day and his assistant

will be paid 500 Rs per day as a fee and per sterilized dog he will be paid 250

Rs for the drugs; under the condition that he would sterilize at least 16 dogs

on one day. This was the usual charge of the Vet.Fac. for a weekend-programme,

even though the Vets from the Faculty where able to carry out more than 16

surgeries in one day. Dr. Jayasinghe then asked for an advance of 35000 Rs to

purchase the drugs at wholesale-rate in advance.

The calculated amount for the drugs per dog includes a long acting antibiotic

(5days) called Benacillin. Dr. Jayasinghe however used a cheap antibiotic

(Doxycillin), which only works for a period of 24 hours. So, we realized, that

he was not interested in the animals' life. Numerous dogs would just have died

due to infections. But not to lose his cooperation we did not complain, but

bought the long acting antibiotic and injected it ourselves after sterilization.

As he was not able to sterilize 16 dogs per day, to his convenience he asked the

dog catchers to catch only 10 dogs in a week or two; sometimes less than that!

-2-

Although we repeatedly told him of the need of catching more dogs, if this

programme is to be a success, our plea was ignored and finally only 370 dogs

were caught in the first year. The standard excuse given to us on inquiring why

not more dogs were caught, was, that the dog-catching-van was broken.

On the 20.Jan 2003 another article by Dr. Jayasinghe appeared in the Daily News,

promoting this programme.

Mid. of Sept. 2003 Dr. Jayasinghe. asked us to increase his fee from 1200 Rs to

1500 Rs. Since his performance was much below the agreed upon numbers of dogs,

we refused to raise the fee. At the same time the KMC-workers involved in the

KMC- sterilization programmes also asked to increase their pay. This also we had

to refuse because the organising of the programmes had become less effective in

the course of the year. The publicity given to the programmes had become less as

time went by and while in the beginning 75% of the total cost per programme was

for the sterilizations and only 25% for organising the programme, by September

2003 we had to spend 75% for the KMC-staff and only 25% were spent on the

sterilizations because the publicity was not given efficiently at all. Therefore

after completing 17 programmes on 6th of September 2004, we decided not to

complete the balance 7 programmes.

One week after we refused the pay-raise, Dr. Jayasinghe started to create

problems in Gohagoda. There he openly threatened to fill up the place (also with

puppies) so we can not cope with the work anymore. Earlier he had instructed the

dogcatchers not to catch small puppies!

The water supply was cut due to non-payment of the water-bills; we had to fix a

pump so we could get the water directly from the river to wash the kennels. The

drinking water for the animals had to be carried in buckets a long way from a

well quite a distance. We had to employ another person, as the KMC worker did

not appear to work regularly. For two months we had no KMC-worker at all.

Then the electricity supply was cut due to non-payment and so we had to pay the

electricity bill for the KMC as the Vet.Dept. refused to pay.

Dr. Jayasinghe instructed the dog-catchers to catch 15 dogs per day and bring

all the puppies to the pound (the dog-pound in Gohagoda is actually built only

to keep around 20 dogs). Now the dog van was never broken, but went to catch

dogs even on Saturdays! We had to build additional kennels for the pups. Added

to this the dog-catchers gave us wrong addresses of the places of capture, so

that we could not return them to their territories or else would misplace them.

They were even asking pet-owners to hand over their dog to be taken to Gohagoda.

Some did and paid even a small sum to the dog catchers in anticipation to get

their dog sterilized, vaccinated and treated for various diseases back in two

weeks time!

Suddently Dr. Jayasinghe informed me, that there will be a meeting with the

Mayor and the KMC on the 03. Oct. 2003. He said that the Councillors are worried

about the dogs and rabies spreading etc.

Fact is that there was not one rabies death reported in Kandy in that period!

-3-

On the 03. Oct. 2003 Mrs. Champa Fernando (KACPAW) and myself attended the

meeting. Neither Champa nor me got the chance to speak there. It was obvious,

that Dr. J. had already frightened the Mayor and the Councillors and the

decision was already made to revert to killing. At that stage we had already

spent around 1.7 mio. Rupees on the programme.

On the 06. Oct. 2003 I asked for another meeting.

A meeting was called for on the 17.10.2003. . This time more people, who were

against the killing of dogs, accompanied me.

After long discussions we were granted to continue the programme and also got

the permission to employ the Vets of the Faculty and other vets in Gohagoda.

First the University-vets were reluctant to sterilize in Gohagoda as Dr.

Jayasinghe still was not giving his o.k. to it. As we were full with animals

(around 120 dogs), we rented a room nearby to sterilize the dogs because Dr.

Jayasinghe had locked the surgery-room!

We had to carry the dogs up and down from the pound to the rented room and it

got so muddy that a pregnant Lady-Vet.surgeon. almost fell. After this incident

the Univerity-Vets did not want to come there anymore, not only because of the

inconvenience, but also because of the lack of hygienic conditions. They

suggested, that we should bring the dogs to the Faculty in Peradeniya on

Saturdays, which we had to do several times even though it was very costly to

hire lorries and added stress for the dogs. Finally after contacting the Mayor

more than once and telling him about the problems, the door to the surgery-room

was opened again.

Still the number of dogs (especially puppies) was increasing day by day; so we

decided to employ two private Vets to come and do the sterilizations at

Gohagoda. They worked very efficiently and asked only minimal charges because

they agreed on our humane approach to the dog-population-control.

As Dr. Jayasinghe heard about the private Vets sterilizing, he locked the room

again, so the vets had to carry out the surgeries in the same hall where the

dogs are held.

In May 2004, I was informed, that the KMC had decided to kill again (again with

the unfounded argument of rabies spreading etc.) We were only informed after the

meeting!

This time the Mayor was out of the country, so we turned to the Governor of the

Central Province for help. He immediately decided, that reverting to killing was

out of question and called for a meeting with Dr.Jayasinghe and the Mayor at his

office. At this meeting Dr. Jayasinghe again was asked to open up the room and

to let us proceed with the programme. To win back Dr.Jayasinghe's cooperation

with the no-kill-policy, he offered him to fund sterilization-programmes in the

community-wards again. Dr.Jayasinghe was asked to prepare a budget for the

programmes and we agreed on another meeting at the Governor's office to plan out

the details. For the second meeting Dr.Jayasinghe had prepared the estimate and

the Governor immediately asked the funds to be released. The first programme was

planned to be held in Dangolla after the Perahera. However it never took place

because the Governor had not released the funds directly to Dr,.Jayasinghe, but

through the KMC. So Dr. Jayasinghe lost his interest because he wanted to be in

charge of the funds without any control by the Commissioner of the KMC. Probably

he had as he did earlier appointed a full pay for the day.

-4-

for himself just for his presence even though the surgeries at such public

programmes were not carried out by him but by the University-vets. He had good

reason to believe, that the commissioner would not approve of such a practice.

If not for this reason we have no clue why he did not go ahead with the

community-programmes.

From September 2004 onwards Dr. Jayasinghe's new strategy was, not to catch any

dogs at all! Whenever we inquired why no dogs were caught, the answer was that

either the van or the catcher were not available. (May be they were busy to

bring dogs from the outskirts into the city in order to create a public

nuisance.???)

After the Dept. stopped catching dogs, naturally more complaints came to the

Dept. about strays. Sometimes people called us also and asked us to remove

certain dogs. When we asked them why they do not call the responsible Dept.,

they told us, that they had already given a call to the Vet.Dept., and the

answer they have received was, that there was no point of catching dogs, because

an NGO would be operating the KMC-dog-pound and they would bring the dogs right

back. Of course they were not told, that we return the dogs as safe dogs,

sterilized and vaccinated.

Another method of trying to create a certain opposition to the humane programme

was, to give wrong information to the media also. A minor incident of a small

puppy getting frightened and biting someone at the Good-Shed - bus-stand in

Kandy, was puffed up into a story about 15 people getting injured because of a

mad dog. Here too the impression was created, that such incidents happen because

of an NGO returning dogs back to the street. Of course it was not written, that

the KMC fails to do its duty of catching dogs and vaccinating them. But every

citizen in Kandy knows, that anti-rabies-vaccinations have not been supplied by

this Dept. since years.

On the 10. Oct.2004 I received a letter from Dr. Jayasinghe asking us to vacate

the office in Gohagoda; A KMC-Vet.Dept.-worker informed us, also to empty the

Kennels as they will start to seize and kill again and the dogs remaining in the

Kennels will be destroyed as well

His explanation was, that there is a rabies threat and the dogs are becoming a

nuisance. Even though these arguments are futile, I just like to mention here,

that during the first year after we started the programme, even though the

output was low due to the non-cooperation of the Vet.Dept., still we noticed,

that the dog-population in the heart of town was stabilised. After Dr.Jayasinghe

started working against us in Oct. 2003, problems arose. One factor was, that

during the meeting on the 17.10.2004 he insisted and received support from the

Mayor on this point, that no dogs should be released back to the heart of the

town. We had to agree, but the disadvantage of such a policy is, that by not

returning the dogs into their habitat, a biological niche is created and dogs

from outside will enter this place because, as long as food-sources are there in

the city, hungry dogs will be attracted. It would have been much wiser, to

return the safe (sterilized and vaccinated) dogs instead of making room for

unsafe dogs, who entered the city from elsewhere. But unfortunately not even the

Mayor listened to us at that time. Now the situation has become worse because

for many months the KMC has not caught dogs in the heart of town and therefore

the new dogs, which have entered are not even sterilized and

-5-

vaccinated. May be this was the purpose of not catching dogs from the city

since many months and stopping catching altogether since September 2004?

An increase of dogs in town would bring up more complaints and more resistance

against the no-kill-policy at least amongst certain communities. The majority of

the Buddhists however are still against killing. We received a confirmation of

this fact when we collected signatures for an appeal to the Mayor and the

Governor, not to allow the KMC to revert to killing. We wanted to show some

evidence of the fact, that the Kandyans are against killing before the second

meeting at the Governor's office in May, therefore we had only four days time

and could devote only a few hours a day to that task, but even in these four

days we collected more than 2000 signatures and in all institutions and shops

where we went, more than 95% of the staff-members undersigned the petition.

Most people know, that most of the dogs have homes or at least someone, who

looks after them, may it be a beggar or a street-vendor, they do not like such

dogs to be killed. The majority of the houses do not have fences, some do not

even have a kennel or a chain to keep the dog at home, therefore many of the

street-dogs are not really strays but domestic dogs.

The dog-catchers cannot discriminate and catch whatever is easy for them to

catch, which are usually the domestic dogs, not the strays, who are timid and

hard to catch. Even Dr. Jayasinghe's own dog was brought to Gohagoda in Dec.

2002. If we were not there, he would have been killed.

It is true, that many domestic dogs are neglected, but their skin-problems etc

we have treated in Gohagoda before returning them, thereby we have not only

relieved the dogs from their suffering, but also helped the owners, who cannot

afford to take their animals for treatment. Most of the people have no

objections against sterilized and vaccinated dogs being returned. If someone

really refuses to accept a stray back near his residence or institution, we

don't insist, but try to find a home for this animal or keep it at Gohagoda. In

some cases I took such unfortunate ones home, which increased the dog-population

in my estate to 57 now.

Dr. Jayasinghe had fully agreed with us on all these issues until September

2003. It is obvious what made him change his mind and course of action.

Since October he became even more determined to stop the programme and even

printed a leaflet and distributed it in Kandy. The leaflet announces the

commencing of catching and killing and states, that rabies is on the up-rise

again.

Two days before distributing these leaflets Dr.Jayasinghe called me and told

that the Health Minister has ordered to kill all the dogs! I knew it can't be

true because the day before the Health Minister had held a meeting on the issue

of humane rabies-prevention-methods and recommended the humane approach.

Dr. P.A.L. Harischandra, Director, Dept. of Public Health and Veterinary

Services also refused to send dog-killers to Kandy as there is no rabies- threat

in Kandy.

However we did not leave Gohagoda and no dogs were killed so far. Except five

dogs they caught on the sly at the Mawilmada-children's-home giving a wrong

statement to the dierector of the home and then took them to the Vet.Faculty,

where they were put to death for " teaching-purposes " .

-6-

On the 23. Nov. 2004 we had a demonstation (protest) in front of the KMC and a

petition was handed over to the Mayor of Kandy.

We were told, that the KMC does not insist on killing, but only wants us to

leave Gohagoda, as those premises belong to the KMC. The time given, to vacate

Gohagoda with our 50 remaining dogs was up to the 15th of Dec. 2004. This would

mean, we must raise funds, put up a fence, build a large building and everything

in a period of three weeks! And the land we were promised by a monk does not

even have water or electricity! It is obvious, that this is neither possible,

nor does it make any sense, that the KMC Vet.Dept. will keep the dogs for three

days starving in Gohagoda and then hand them over to us to be transported to a

place out of town. If they were really catching 10 dogs per day as they should,

we would collect 3000 dogs in one year. what sense does it make and who can feed

such a number? We agreed, that we would take the dogs of the heart of town if

there were real strays, and the Mayor did not ask more than that, but after

returning home Mr.Gunawardana from the Vet.Dept. gave me a call and said, that

we should not misunderstand the agreement, what was really meant, was that all

the dogs from the KMC area must be taken by us and none can be put back to his

territory after sterilization and vaccination. No wonder, that Dr.Jayasinghe did

not want to say that in front of everyone present.

Immediately we turned to the Governor again, because he is firm on the

no-kill-attitude of the predominant religion in our country and he suggested,

that we should attend the meeting on the 14th of December in Colombo, which will

finalise the Humane Policy for the whole of Sri Lanka. He said it makes no sense

to revert to killing in Kandy, where already 3 Mio. Rs. have been spend on a

humane programme, while the rest of the country is moving forward to put the

teaching of Lord Buddha into practice.

However Dr.Jayasinghe did not heed the Governors letter, in which he was asked,

not to revert to killing, but to wait until the committee for a new

rabies-elimination-act would meet on December 14th , instead he gave orders to

his dog-catcher to catch 10 dogs per day for one week, put them into the

main-building of the pound, which we were supposed to vaccate for that purpose,

and to kill them the following Monday. Our only option now was to go to courts

to be able to continue with the ABC-programme.

After taking all facts into consideration the Kandy DC Judge decided in favour

of SoFA to stay in Gohagoda and continue with the programme.. The KMC was to

submit their objections in July 2005; no objections were filed by them! But 2

weeks later Dr. Jayasinghe, on television misleads the people with his

announcement of a 300% increase of rabies in Kandy! If that was true, that would

have been a very valid objection against the court-order, but since it is not

only untrue, but the opposite is the case, and therefore could not have been

proven in courts, he did not file it. In TV however he did not have to prove

what he said and was allowed to make such false statements and when we turned to

the channel to correct this misleading information, we were told, that we cannot

say anything

After this order was issued, we had to face further obstructions through Dr.

Jayasinghe:

1. He stopped us with the help of the police from carrying out some minor

essential repairs in Gohagoda dog-pound.

2. He tried to stop us catching dogs through the police on the 19th of June. The

police requested a letter from us, that the KMC is giving us permission to catch

dogs. Such a permission was, after requesting, not granted by Dr. Jayasinghe.

After showing the court-order to the DIG, he advised us to carry on and catch.

3. We had printed a leaflet, informing the dog-owners about the possibility, to

get dogs vaccinated and sterilized free of charge by SOFA. Our plan was to

announce with loudspeakers and at the same time distribute the leaflets. For

this one needs a permit of the Police, but when we tried to obtain this permit,

one of the officers wanted us to bring a letter from the Mayor to state that he

has no objections against our leaflet. Actually the Police cannot demand such a

letter because the fundamental right of speech cannot be made dependant on the

Mayor's permission, but in order to avoid conflict, we tried to obtain this

letter, but it was refused by the Mayor. Our lawyer then informed the police,

that the fundamental rights cannot be made dependant on anyone's permit..

-7-

On the 13th July, Dr. Jayasinghe ordered to kill on the spot. The

KMC-dog-catcher said, that they had to kill dogs in the Kandy-market because

they would steal fruits and vegetables after closing the market! Most of the 15

dogs killed that night had owners and all were sterilized and vaccinated! We

heard from people in other areas also the next day, that dogs were missing in

the morning.

Dr. Jayasinghe was then given a letter of warning (contempt of courts) by our

lawyer.

We also made an entry at the Police the following day and few days later we were

informed, that Dr.Jayasinghe, when questioned by the Police, had answered, that

he had consulted his lawyer and was told, that the court-order did not

explicitly say, that the KMC should not kill. We explained to the DIG, that

killing is an obstruction of the programme and he should therefore stop the

killing if it happens again. He agreed, that the court-order, which orders the

KMC, not to obstruct the programme, obviously implies, that the sterilized and

vaccinated dogs should not be killed and the ones, which are not yet sterilized,

should be caught and handed over to us in Gohagoda.

Another few days later, Dr.Jayasinghe made an entry against us, claiming, that

we are preventing him, to carry out his duty and that we should take

responsibility if any rabies-case occurs in Kandy. We answered, that we take the

responsibility, if he is not destroying the sterilized and vaccinated dogs and

by that attracting unsafe dogs to the city.

Beginning of August Dr.Jayasinghe informed a journalist of the Kandy-Times, that

on 29th of July the KMC has passed a resolution, that in future dogs will be

killed on the spot since the pound is not available to keep the dogs for three

days before killing them.

When we later inquired from one of the councillors, why they agreed to this

resolution, he said that Dr. Jayasinghe has produced a letter of the

Peradeniya-Teaching-Hospital, which shows that 300% more vaccines were ordered

than previously as a proof, that dog-bites have increased by 300%. He was then

very shocked, when we showed him letters from the General Hospital Kandy and

Teaching Hospital Peradeniya, giving the details for each month and showing 50%

decrease of post-exposure-vaccinations during the last one and half years. In

the next KMC-meeting he was trying to complain about Dr.Jayasighe cheating the

council in order to get this resolution passed, but he was not allowed to speak

about it by the Mayor. He has now made a complaint to the Commissioner about

this and it might have consequences for Dr.Jayasighe and the Mayor because of

these unclean procedures, but the council will most probably not take back the

resolution because many councillors are not in favour of the humane programme,

they think killing solves the immediate problem, which in Kandy is actually not

rabies, but the very sight of dogs on the road, which is being regarded by some

councillors as a nuisance. For them this completely irrelevant letter and the

conclusion drawn from it, was a welcome opportunity to pass this resolution,

while other councillors have been really misled and would not have agreed to the

resolution if they had inspected this letter carefully and verified its

significance.

Soon after the article appeared in the Kandy-Times, a loudspeaker-vehicle

appeared in Kandy, announcing the kill on sight policy to be implemented. At

this time a religious festival started in Kandy and several Buddhist priests

appealed to the KMC, not to kill the dogs. In response Dr.Jayasinghe announced,

that he will not start killing during the festival, which shows his total

ignorance of the religion he claims to practice. The Buddhist precept, not to

harm any living being applies of course to every day of our lives, not only to

religious festive days.

After the festival was over, on 25. August we heard, that the KMC was planning

to embark on killing dogs the following day. We immediately called the

Chiefminister to prevent this, and he gave a call to Dr.Jayasinghe early

morning, but he did not heed the higher authority's veto, neither did he stop,

when we made an entry and filed a case against him because of contempt of

court.: hundreds of dogs were caught and killed with poison in a very cruel

manner until 30th of Aug. (day and night); most of the killed dogs were

sterilized and vaccinated!

This terror ended for a few days because the vehicle was not available any

longer, then again we were informed, that the killing had resumed, though not in

such a massive manner. For the last few days we had no news of dogs being

killed, but today it was announced,