The kandur waan (traditional bakers shop) is an essential part of the Kashmiri social life. The residents in every locality visit the shop at least twice daily to buy bread; morning – Tsot or Girda & Lavasa, after noon – Tilwor or Tsotwor, any time – Kulicha, Bakerkhani, on demand- Roath, makai tsot etc. While waiting for their turn to receive the bread particularly in the early morning hours, many customers participate in discussions ranging from gossip, colony or locality issues to political debate & moral lectures.
The kandur shop is currently also a regular hangout spot for the stray/street/feral dogs. One or two dogs closely tail customers from a distance of at least a furlong. They wait a few feet away and accompany the person on return. The shop including the adjacent area where a heap of chopped or pre-chopped firewood used in baking is placed, often remains cordoned-off by at least half a dozen dogs “round the clock”. Unlike pet dogs, the strays follow no bodies’ instructions and pass stool in the same area & sprinkle urine over the firewood often after lifting the hind leg.
The person visiting the kandur has to avoid closely standing or sitting and alert dogs. For accomplishment of the task safely, he has to hold the loose garments close to the body and adopt unusual postures while passing the danger zone. At times wait for the courtesy of the dog/s obstructing the way becomes inevitable. Help from a passer-by or another customer is always welcome.
According to one report published recently in a popular local English daily, sixty thousand (60,000) dog bite cases were presented at Anti Rabies Clinic, SMHS, Kashmir over a period of one decade and in Srinagar district alone, thirteen (13) persons receive bites every day. The kandur shop is one of the spots where comparatively higher number of encounters is possible.
Leaving the physical harm aside, the stray dogs harbour a large number of infectious & infestation agents. Although most of these diseases are not visible in the animal from a distance but skin problems & ectoparasite infestations are easily noticed in a good proportion of them. The stray dogs (except the lucky ones surgically sterilized at Shuhama or Tengpora) don’t receive any disease preventive vaccines & medicines and so can be a source of several zoonotic diseases (transmitted from animals to humans).
In India, the most common zoonotic diseases transmitted from dogs include Rabies (routed through a rabid or carrier dog’s saliva on bite wound or laceration), Leptospirosis (dog urine), Lyme Disease (bite by ticks fed on infected dog’s blood), Campylobacter infection, Cryptosporidosis, Toxocara Canis and Echinococosis (feco-oral route), Ring worm and Scabies (contact with infected dog), Ancylostomiasis (eggs in feces turned to larvae in soil – contact or oral), Dipylidiasis (accidental ingestion of dog or cat fleas), Giardiasis (water contaminated with dog stools), and Dirofilariasis (mosquitoe bite – fed on infested dog blood).
While baking the bread, the heat generated in the clay-oven (tandoor) is expected to kill most of the infective organisms. However, every now and then, the kandur with raw hands puts the fire wood (that could harbour the infective material on its surfaces and crevices) inside the tandoor and continues to handle & hand-over the baked bread directly to the customer without following any sanitization protocol. This routine practice in the kandur shop may be helping spread of the disease agents to humans: a public health issue necessitating scientific surveys on priority. Experts propagating the “one health concept” need to intervene at multiple fronts.
The pack of stray dogs continues to stay around the kandur shop to relish the bread delivered by few customers. They purchase extra bread daily, chop it into several pieces and throw them “in front of the kandur waan”. For them it is a practice of compassion for animals. Despite several requests by our kandur, nobody appears ready to avoid this practice. I have personally been trying to interact and persuade some of such guys to feed dogs away from the kandur shop. However, they either refuse to get engaged in this type of discussion or leave the place in a while after passing few offensive remarks.
‘It is the little things that matter’. Hope the seriousness of the issue is realized by the public in general. Let us all show due concern and not underestimate the significance of such little things when health of the lives across species is at stake.
(The Author is Ex- Prof. & Head, University Veterinary Hospital, Shuhama, Srinagar)
