india

Updated: Jun 30, 2019 02:18 IST

The killing of two infants by feral dogs in Dayalpur village of Saharanpur in a span of three days has compelled the authorities to deploy a platoon of Provincial Armed Constabulary (PAC) to protect the villagers from further attacks.

Inspector of Behat Kotwali, Pawan Choudhary, said a platoon of PAC, comprising 14 jawans, has been guarding the village along with teams of police, forest department and nagar nigam.

“They were deployed to protect villagers and their children from attacks of a group of man-eater dogs,” said Choudhary.

The inspector said one Amresho, wife of Om Karan, was sleeping in her house with her 28-day-old infant on Friday but when she woke up she found her child missing. “After hectic search, the family members and villagers found a group of feral dogs feeding on something and they fled on seeing the crowd. When the villagers went closer they found the mutilated body of the child,” the inspector said.

Choudhary said on June 25, a bunch of feral dogs carried away one Rajneesh’s 3-month-old child named Abhimanyu while he was sleeping with his mother. His mutilated body was recovered near his house later, he said.

Ranger of Shivalik Forest Range RN Kimoti said he has been staying in the village since Friday and so far 14 dogs have been caught and released in the jungle. Wildlife expert and chairman of Wildlife Sciences Department in Aligarh Muslim University (AMU) Dr Affifullah Khan attributes over-feeding of dogs on carcasses in ‘hadwar’, effluents of meat factories and slaughter houses in making their body ‘stout’ and also instilling the instinct of wild dogs in them.