A lot among us are afraid of dogs. Here we list a few do's and dont's that should help in dealing with the strays on campus.

Aggressive behaviour

Dogs can become aggressive for a few reasons. The first is hormonal which can simply be taken care of by neutering (castration or spaying). The second is, how he has been treated. If he is treated with gentleness and compassion, he will be your 'best friend', because he trusts you. If you throw stones at him, hit him with sticks and umbrellas, etc. this will obviously be replaced with distrust. This can grow into aggression towards you or others, especially kids.The third is sensing a need to protect ‘his people or territory’. Simply letting it know that we are ok and do not need his protection firmly does the trick. This needs some experience to understand dog behaviour, but some of us can help showing how. The fourth and perhaps the most important is how they form behaviour patterns in the initial 2 months of their lives by observing their mother and her behaviour towards people. This gets ingrained in them for all their lives. If the mother is wary of humans and shies away or is aggressive towards them, then there is a good chance that so will they and it is very difficult to get over their distrust later. It is necessary therefore that in this period, if possible, we can build their trust in humans and override the maternal indoctrination.

But most often, what is read as aggression by us is simply vocalisation and posturing by the dog towards someone or something it is insecure about or fears. It is us who read it as aggression and react in a way that might actually trigger aggressive behaviour. Simply ignoring the dog and not showing any fear works in most cases. In some cases just standing your ground but avoiding direct eye contact with the dog works. IT NEVER WORKS TO LET THE DOG KNOW YOU ARE SCARED OF HIM OR YOU WILL HARM HIM IN SOME WAY. This will almost always aggravate the situation.

Let us understand what this does manage to achieve. When someone attacks or even pretends to do so, the dog has 2 possible ways to react, Fight or Flight. If the person is much larger, he is likely to choose the latter. If he is smaller, there are good chances that he will choose to fight. So a boy picking up a ball, seems not too different from a stone to the dog. You can figure out for yourselves what his likely reaction would be. Even then, the dog, most often, will do a mock charge to scare off the danger. Even if the size of the boy, is small, most dogs would not bite (though some might if it has already been taught how effective this is to scare humans). So the possible reason that the dog goes after someone is because WE HAVE TRAINED HIM TO DO SO!

Barking and Howling

Dogs genetically communicate with each other over distances through barking and howling. Unacceptably irritating as it might be to a person who has a small kid in his house or someone who is unwell, the fact is that the dogs are just being dogs with no intention of irritating or harming anyone.

Throwing stones at the dog or chasing them away when they are not barking or howling is absolutely useless as the dogs do not understand at all why you are doing this and will only tend to get aggressive. Only if you react to them exactly at the time they are doing it, will they perhaps understand. If you want to be effective, gentler ways of doing it work better. While the dogs are simply guilty of being dogs, when we react harshly, we humans are guilty of being less human (and incidentally it is against the law).

Dogs chasing someone or something

Dogs like to chase. They chase each other all the time. Its their instinct. So if someone runs away from them, they most likely will. Solution is DON'T RUN AWAY. So simple, one wonders why people run at all. Unfortunately, quite often, we transfer our fears to our kids (consciously or otherwise) and they will be frightened and run. When parents are scared, their kids are too. All it needs is to help them and yourselves to get over this fear. We can offer our help to anyone in our area for this. If you do not fear dogs, they will know that. They are experts at reading body language and will not dare to attack or run after you. Similarly, if you show fear, they will know that too and react accordingly.

Strays

I fully agree that we should not encourage strays in our premises. They cannot all be monitored for behaviour and diseases. I personally have chased away strays who tried to make our building their territory, who were showing signs of aggression and uncontrolled pack behaviour.

But most of the dogs in question were born and have grown up in the very location they live. This is their home. As self-proclaimed owners of this earth and all resources in it, we may not see it that way, but if we think like custodians instead, this concept is easy to grasp. Also given that this is their home, your attempts to drive them away will only be temporary, and they will come back, the minute they will feel it is safe. From the dog's point of view, when they are driven away, you are forcing them to leave their home and venture into the territories of other dogs. This may cause other dogs to attack them. Some of these may be infected with something and when they come back, you will be faced with the very situation that you are trying to prevent.

Paradoxically all of us are temporary residents in quarters that IIT has provided us and can move to another house if and when available and we feel like. So actually, if you think about this, we have migrated into their territory. But being dogs and not humans, they have by and large accepted this situation and us.

So rather than looking at them as some creatures that we need to drive away, I propose that we solve the aggressive behaviour issue and adopt them for good, show compassion and understanding rather than dislike and aggression. All of us are capable of this and this makes us better human beings.

Feeding

The PHO has sent out mails in the past saying "Do Not Feed the Dogs in the Premises"!!! Please DO NOT STOP FEEDING THE DOGS OR PREVENT SOMEONE ELSE FROM DOING SO. The reasons are given below and it will be fairly obvious that these are not misplaced and in fact are in interest of the residents and their children.

In contrast to the effect of throwing stones, feeding makes the dogs bond with us and thus friendly rather than aggressive. Secondly a well fed dog is automatically less aggressive, as it does not have to hunt for food or fight for it. It also reduces their need to forage in garbage bins to feed themselves. Thirdly, this also ensures they are healthier and can resist infections and diseases better. All this is more desirable for both the dogs and the humans who have to encounter or interact with them.

In fact it is a lovely idea for the people (including the kids) who are frightened of the dogs to feed them. This way, it will give them a chance to get over their fear and the dog will have no inclination to be aggressive with such a person. What should be ensured though is not to feed the dogs in the canteens or mess where they get into a habit of begging for food from people. Please do not feed the dogs in these public eating places and stop others who do. But by all means feed them if you want to in a specific place where they won't be a nuisance to anyone else.

The Trauma of being attacked by a dog

As a dog lover, since my childhood to the present day, I am perplexed by people who fear dogs with no real negative experience. But I do understand the fear of those who have been attacked and bitten. In our generation, there are a lot of these. One of the main reason is that at the time most of us were growing up, the value of dogs was as 'security guards' . People preferred that their dogs bark, chase and bite intruders. So most of us have had experiences of being chased and bitten. On talking to scores of people a surprising revelation was that in most cases, this was not their reason for fearing dogs, but the many injections that followed.

Fair enough, if you are bitten, there is a likelihood of a serious infection like rabies if the dog has not been vaccinated, the injections are a good precaution. Most dog experts will tell you though that the best person to advise you on this is a vet and not your doctor. The doctor often favours excessive caution to prevent any physical illness. But in the process, becomes an accomplice along with the parents in creating a lifelong fear in the person towards dogs, because of which he may run away from them at the slightest provocation and cause more traumatic incidents to occur. In most cases, there is no actual biting. The dogs often snap to scare rather than actually bite. Injuries often have been caused by the reaction of pulling away one’s hand in such cases. In many other cases it is just scratches from the dog’s nails as it jumps on the person, sometimes in a friendly way but interpreted as an attack out of fear. As a kid I have been scratched by strays while playing with them many many many times. In those days, none of them were vaccinated. Never have I been infected.

My appeal to parents is that though it is understood that your duty towards your children as parents is to take care of his physical health. It is also important to make sure that no psychological scars are created, or else, he will remain vulnerable to attack by dogs all his life.A scared kid will tend to run or react fearfully when he or she encounters a street dog and the next one might actually bite him, actually have rabies or something else. Please prepare your children (and yourselves) to prevent a dog from attacking them rather than making them susceptible.

The Dog in question

If you have an incident with a particular dog, please report to the committee. We will evaluate the situation and see the best course of action. Street dogs are a reality, sometimes an immense source of joy and at others a nuisance. But the best course of action is to understand them and manage the situation as best as we can.

So in conclusion:

1. Please do not force these dogs out of their living areas. This is their home, even if they do not have the ability to convince you about it.

2. Feeding dogs good food is desirable, but should be done in the appropriate way and place.

3. Vaccination and neutering of dogs should be done.

4. Dogs are dogs, irritating as they might be. Throwing stones and beating not only makes the situation worse, it makes us less human.

5. Learn and teach your kids to get over the fear of dogs. It is safer for you (and the dogs who have to bear the repercussions of your reactions)

6. Try and be custodians and not owners of the resources you are blessed with for being born human.