New Delhi: PETA India has urged veterinary regulatory bodies to implement and enforce the ban on cosmetic tail-docking and ear-cropping of dogs, saying performing these traumatising procedures was "illegal".
The animal rights organisation last week in a letter to the Veterinary Council of India (VCI) and the Animal Welfare Board of India (AWBI) urged the bodies to enforce the ban under the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals (Dog Breeding and Marketing) Rules, 2017.
PETA had also sent letters to the central and state animal-husbandry departments, veterinary colleges and universities, and veterinarians' associations in this regard.
Tail-docking and ear-cropping are cruel cosmetic veterinary procedures that are commonly practiced to give certain breeds so-called desirable traits, PETA said.
Some veterinarians, breeders, and others perform cruel, disfiguring surgeries that can cause dogs great suffering, it said. Ears of animals are usually "cropped" when they are just eight to 12 weeks old. The process of taping and re-taping puppies' ears is often agonising to the animals, the organisation said. "Performing traumatising, acutely painful procedures on puppies just to satisfy the arbitrary whims of humans regarding how they should look goes against veterinary ethics and, importantly, is also illegal.
"PETA India is calling on veterinarians across India to refuse to take blades, knives, or scissors to dogs' ears and tails for cosmetic purposes and is urging authorities to prosecute breeders found performing these mutilations themselves," the animal rights body's India CEO Manilal Valliyate said.
The cruel procedures were originally banned by the VCI in 2011 following an advisory issued by the AWBI. The board had explained that non-therapeutic tail-docking and ear-cropping mutilations amount to cruelty to animals under the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals Act, 1960, and that performing such procedures are, therefore, punishable offences.
"Maiming dogs also violates Sections 429 of the Indian Penal Code (IPC). Nevertheless, the Madras High Court overturned the ban in 2013. The AWBI filed an appeal against the order that is still pending, and PETA India has filed an intervention application in the matter. "Although this 2017 Rule has been challenged before the high court of Delhi, the Rajasthan High Court and the Madras High Court, no interim stay has been granted to the petitioners, and the provisions of the Rules remain in force," PETA said.