Telangana: Outrage over poisoning of dogs in Khammam

HYDERABAD: Several healthy dogs have been poisoned in Proddutur village of Khammam district in the last few days. While complaints have accused local panchayat office of the killings, the police have denied the allegations.
The deaths triggered outrage among animal activists and a few pet owners in the village. They alleged that panchayat officials injected the dogs with poison after receiving complaints of stray dog attacks in the locality.
“We can hardly see any dogs in the village from past three days.My pet dog was also killed and I know this for sure because I have seen two people on the bike who were going around injecting dogs in the village. All the dogs have disappeared all of a sudden,” said M Prem Kumar, a resident of Proddutur.
“We also found two huge pits in the outskirts of the village where the carcasses of the dogs were dumped. We just found the body of one dog. We are waiting for the police to exhume the bodies from the pits for further investigation,” said Kumar.
Speaking to TOI, sub-inspector R Uma said, “Upon enquiry, the locals agreed that they have killed the dogs because they were attacking them. We do not think the panchayat is involved.” TOI tried reaching out to the panchayat officials, all calls went unanswered.
A case has been registered under section 428 of the IPC. However, no arrests have been made in the case yet.
“There is no end to dog killing in Telangana. We are witnessing these incidents quite often in municipal limits as well as in gram panchayats,” said N Pravalika of Compassionate Society for Animals, an animal welfare organisation.