Cute aren’t they? Well only one survived. Yes it’s a heart
breaking real life story. When it started? We need to go back a couple of years
–
Around January 2019, five puppies started to come near our
home for drinking water –
I don’t have picture of 5th one. Only 3 survived –
The black one with white paws, the blonde one and the one with the spots. These
3 cute puppies, 2 females (Kallu and Bhuri) and 1 male (spotty), found out they
can peacefully live near our house because there is always water and left over food
was served at night.
Somewhere around December 2019 both females gave birth. Kallu
had 6 puppies; they all died rather an unfortunate death. One of our neighbours
put them in hole thinking that they would be safe there, the neighbour fell
ill and couldn’t get out of the house for a couple of days and completely
forgot about the puppies, when she remembered it was too late.
Bhuri had 4 puppies. One day me and my mother took a stroll
to see where did Bhuri kept its puppies. What we saw was priceless. As Bhuri
was weak due to child birth kallu and spotty were guarding these 4 different
shades of brown and blond –
All 7 of them lived like any normal human family. They took shelter
near our house because there no one could hit them, they could get water and
food and the Man with vegetable cart always gave them tomatoes. But our spotty
is a real Alpha.
Soon it started attacking the puppies and its sisters for
food though he did never hurt them but he certainly scared them. After some
time one of the puppies died of sickness. The 3 puppies started growing up on
whatever left over we could provide them. In a few months they actually grew up
to be healthy.
Then it came the age of Pandemic, nationwide lockdown
declared in end of March 2020. One of puppies (Guchlu) took permanent shelter
under our car, because it wasn’t going anywhere and Kallu was expecting again.
Under the influence of its survival instinct, it needed more food so Kallu drove
Bhuri away. The other 2 puppies also started keeping their distance because Kallu
had started having a temper. No one could budge Guchlu because it was under my
protection, and during the lockdown it grew up to be a full grown dog (almost).
In early June 2020 Kallu gave birth to 5 adorable black
puppies in an extended section of a hut just in front of our house. From here
the story of our joy and grief starts.
My mother gave Kallu Porridge (which she specially made for Kallu)
and Laddu (made to overcome the weakness of child birth). It became a routine
for me to check up on those puppies every now and then during my work from home
period. Just after a week the owner of the hut returned from their village
because of “Unlock”. My parents asked them to not to move the puppies for some
time and they agreed. The hut owner had little kids so he sealed the front of the
hut with sacks, left a little space so that only dogs can pass by.
One day my mother noticed a lot of ants in the hut and asked
the owner to throw some powder to get rid of ants. Now the puppies were a
little over 20 Days and had their eyes opened. When the owner took off the
sacks to throw the powder, Kallu already had so many wounds caused by Ants and
the puppies were introduced to the whole new world. Till then they had no idea
that anyone else was out there. Kallu became very weak and she had to leave the
puppies though kept checking on them. There was only Guchlu who was kind of jealous
with these puppies because they had my full attention. Kallu’s visits became
less frequent and the puppies were left on the mercy of no one. For puppies it
was a new world and they wanted to explore it as much as they can without any
idea of what’s waiting for them out there.
We spent our noon counting them to check if all of them are
there and nights putting them back in the hut but once they were out of the hut
it was hard to put them back there. It was Monsoon season, when it rained they
had no idea where to go so they would just sit in front of our home and cry. I
had to put them in the hut at midnight to keep them safe from rain. If I put
one in the hut the other one would get out. I was so much out of my front door
that I actually became aware that what the last names of my neighbors are.
During the Work from home I got tan which I never had when I used to travel to
office. I actually started applying sunscreen during Work from home because
every now and then I had to go out in order to watch the puppies – if all of
them were there?, if all of them were safe?, did they need food or water or
shelter? My father even kept them inside the front gate when a JCB was running
down the road. That was the shittiest half an hour my house has ever seen. I
even helped my mother in cleaning it because I was afraid if she had to do it
all by herself, she would never let me keep the puppies inside.
Soon these puppies became talk of the town and everyone
wanted to touch them, hold them, and play with them. People from neighborhood
who I never talked to before or saw before would come to just watch the
puppies. Some people would actually take the puppies with them for a couple of
hours.
On a July Sunday I decided to give them a quick bath.
I wanted them to be all cleaned up so that I can play with
them. It was a tough job to put them together because whenever they saw their
mother they ran in her direction without knowing anything about the dangers of
real world. Some kids helped me to find them and these kids had all kind of
questions – do you take care of these puppies? Can we come to your house and
play with them? What do they eat? Etc. etc.
Somehow we managed to give them all a bath and lots of
toast. They slept through the day and played through the evening. It was a
delight to watch them play with each other, sleep over each other. They were
such a bundle of joy.
The very next day the same kids came and told me that one of
the puppies had been killed by a big dog. I didn’t believe this kid and My
father went to check. He told me that it had died and kids had dug a grave for
the puppy and buried it. They even put some flowers over the grave.
Next day those kids came and they asked me if they wanted to
build a house for the puppies would I allow it. Of course I allowed it. At the
time there is nothing I wanted more than a house for the puppies. I could not
keep them inside my house because my parents are senior citizens, once this
pandemic situation clears I would be spending my days at office and it would be
too much for my parents to take care of puppies. The kids started building a
house of cardboards which soon became their own instrument of play.
After the death of one of puppies I became more protective
of them, I would go after them if they left the street for their mother and
bring them back. I was afraid that they will be attacked by the same dog again.
I counted them first thing after getting up in morning and before going to
sleep in night. I spent one whole afternoon looking for one puppy which was
found by a kid for me. Somehow I managed to train them to come back on my call;
somehow I managed to keep them in front of my eyes. When I called they ran back
to me on their small paws, that’s the happiness I have never felt before
considering we used to have 2 dogs long back. I felt a bit relaxed because the
puppies were able to found their way back.
On a Wednesday evening around 8 o’clock, I just counted them
and checked my office messenger; I had to take a quick call. I was on call and
heard my mother say to my father - someone has killed 2 puppies. I did not
believe it, I couldn’t focus on the meeting, and I told them that I will
connect later and disconnected the call. I ran outside, there I saw two of them
just lying there.
One of puppies had its gut out on the road –
And the other one just died in its sleep, it wasn’t even
visibly hurt.
Someone bought a new car and decided to drive over them. I
have never seen such a heart breaking sight in my life so close to my eyes. We
couldn’t eat or sleep. When some of us confronted the driver about the accident
he wasn’t even aware that he had killed two puppies.
Only 2 puppies left which I called chhoti and moti. The very
next day chhoti became sick, we took care of him, gave them small amount of
medicine and in a couple of days it started looking better.
Chhoti was clearly in distress while Moti was a happy go
lucky. Moti wanted to play but Chhoti was sad. They wanted their mother who
just knew something has happened – what or how she could not understand. Whenever she tried to keep an eye on the
puppies from a distance at one of the neighbors’ front gate, our very
considerate neighbor would throw a bucket full of water on her in order to get
rid of her. She did not come near them because they wanted to be fed and she
didn’t have any strength to feed them.
My father arranged a box for the puppies so that they won’t
sleep on the road. I put it at our front gate so that I can see them from
inside the house. I covered the box with plastic, umbrella and rain coat so
that they didn’t have to worry about the weather. By this time our Guchlu
started growling at the puppies whenever they went near him. Sometimes spotty
came to check on them but he is not very fatherly.
After 3 days on Sunday, one family who used to visit before
to watch the puppies adopted Moti. It was also gone. Chhoti was left alone with
Guchlu who wasn’t very friendly. It was in its box (which became its house), at
night when we turned off the lights, it started crying. I gave it some
re-assurance, put it to sleep, came back inside and it started crying again. I
took it inside, it was happy, wanted to explore the front porch, I turned off
the lights went to sleep and it started crying again. I checked on it and hoped
that its mother will come after hearing the cry. She eventually came and we all
went to sleep. The next in the afternoon Chhoti started crying again, I had to work;
I couldn’t give it company so I took it in and somehow managed to put it to
sleep. In the evening it played joyfully, in the night it understood that the
box was its house and Chhoti went inside the box on its own free will. Chhoti
was getting used to of all of this, getting used to of us taking care of it,
Guchlu growling at it, its mother running away from it. Whenever it was
sleeping we kept our voices low, because whenever Chhoti heard us, it would want
to come to us. It did not even try to follow its mother after going 20 Feet. I again
became a bit relaxed thinking that Chhoti can now survive in this world.
On Thursday Chhoti fell ill, we tried to give it some
medicine, when it did not improve Chhoti’s health we called a Doctor next day.
Chhoti was beyond saving by then but still the Doctor tried everything he
could. In the afternoon Chhoti passed away and it broke my heart to see this
small, beautiful, adorable creature to go this cold and rigid. Now Kallu keeps
coming at our front door thinking that we might have its kid.
I don’t cry much. Whenever I cry it is either for my own or
my family’s problems. It makes me sad when I think about them. I miss these
puppies, I miss seeing them first thing in the morning, I miss putting them to sleep
in night, I miss feeding them, and I miss playing with them. I don’t think I
can get attach to a person in a whole year or in a life time as much as I got
attached to these puppies in a month.
