My meeting with Piddi was a pure stroke of luck. She came into my life a year after I had started loving dogs. Why a juncture specified to mark the distinction for – before I loved dogs, and after I started loving dogs? Because it is essential information to my saga with dogs.
Since my childhood I had been petrified of animals, especially dogs. I try hard to recollect why, but I have no reason. Maybe the narrow escape from their chases, or how they barked at my friends and I when we ran whilst playing. The big change in my life of me turning into a dog lover came in 2016 with the arrival of Lucky Sahab. I did not pet him, I did not hold him, but I fell in love with him the moment I saw him. I amazed myself when I got him home, considering how scared I was of dogs. The fact that he was just a couple of months old did not give me any sense of authority over him. I was petrified of this little ball of fur. Nevertheless, he came home, I did not leave my room for 2 days fearing him, but fell in love with him as days passed. A week later, I found myself caressing his back.
Falling in love with Lucky was a turning point of my life. I did not fall in love with just Lucky, I fell in love with every dog I laid my eyes on. I wanted to adopt more dogs and even thought of their names. After Lucky, I wanted a dog named Barkat. A couple of months later, entered Chhotu. Chhotu was hardly a month old hazel coloured Indie pup. Someone had abandoned him near our house. We would bring him inside but the vivacious little Chhotu liked it better outside. For Chhotu, we got bowls to fill with food and water. I would spend hours watching him sleep on our stairs. Little Chhotu had my heart. And, one day he just vanished. We tried to search, asked people, but couldn’t find him. I spent nights crying in sleep. Would sit by my window hoping to see him again, but he never came back. With time, I also tried and moved on. But, did I?
Fast forward to the next year. An old bitch lived near our house who was known as Laali. Laali, who gave birth to a litter every year. None of Laali’s kids ever survived, because the lane she lived in had many cars, and the family who looked after her never cared enough to take the kids in their front yard or to take their foster kid, Laali to the vet. That year, when Laali gave birth, she started living near our house because of the construction work that was happening in her area. Her babies followed her. We started looking after Laali and her babies who had just started walking. They were four, and Piddi was one of them. All of them were different, and Piddi was the most distinct of them all. She had a milky white fur with black spots. A friend once commented that she looks like a dalmatian. This was Laali’s first litter that lived for this long, and the neighbours did take a notice. And, probably how they jinxed it. The babies started dying one by one. Nobody knew what was happening. We all were perplexed. Piddi had survived but one day she looked very sick. My mother took a notice. She went out to examine her. Laali was sitting near Piddi. She looked at my mother with her eyes filled with tears. My mother immediately took Piddi to a vet. She was given injections, medicines, and glucose. The vet said that had we not brought her that day, she wouldn’t have survived. Heat, it was heat that caused her siblings’s lives. Piddi had few bandages on her body that needed to be removed after a day, and few medicines that she had to take. We did not leave her out as she needed proper care. But Laali couldn’t bear the separation with her only surviving child. She would howl, she would bark, she refused to eat and drink. We had to let Piddi go on the second day.
Piddi was healthy again. She was the most vivacious, active kid on the street. Laali and Piddi went back to their ‘gate’ of the foster family, but Piddi often came to meet us, to walk with my father, and to play with Lucky. The same year in December, Laali gave birth to a baby, Brownie. Her last.
A few months later, someone ran a car over her legs. She couldn’t move, get up, eat or drink. She cried the whole day and night. It was at this moment that I realised how difficult it is to get help from organizations for animals. I made a dozen calls to vets, shelter homes, hospitals, all in vain. At the end, one paravet agreed to come but the next morning. Meanwhile, I gave her a painkiller. The next morning, I went to check on her before paravet’s arrival but she was gone. The neighbours said that her foster family gave her to a hospital. I never saw her again. (I got shouted at by the paravet for ‘wasting’ his time despite him getting paid.)
Piddi and Brownie were not the only babies who were sad that day. Every dog was.
Soon, Piddi was expecting her first litter. I was enraged! She was hardly a year old. The neighbours looked pleased with her protruding belly, and their delight disgusted me. She was so small. She was a baby! I was concerned for her. But her delivery was free of complications. She gave birth to a big litter, and how happy she was! I remember how she came to our gate and signalled to follow her to see her babies! A sight to behold. My little Piddi was a proud big mamma! Seeing her looking after her babies warmed our hearts. Then one day, a man who lived there, put her babies on the intersection of the roads. And they all died. They all came under the cars. The news reached us through our old domestic helper who told us that Piddi bit the man who did this. And, she was never the same. She became irritable. She stopped playing. She would just lie down on the road motionless. She became pregnant again. Soon we heard that she had started biting people who passed by. After her delivery, her aggression elevated. She would chase two wheelers, she would bite little children. She was never the same again. One day, a huge ruckus was created. Two groups had formed, one who wanted to get rid of her, and the other who wanted her to stay (but did not want to get her operated or take care of her or her kids). Shouting, cursing, fighting. And the next day, Piddi and her babies were taken away. Where? I don’t know. How are they? I don’t know. Are they still alive? I really don’t know.
All that I know is, that her image fails to fade in my memories. I often hear myself saying, Kaash, Laali had let us keep her. Kaash, they hadn’t gone back to their lane. Kaash, the man had not displaced her kids. Kaash. Everytime I think of Piddi, a lump gets formed in my throat. I have cried many nights thinking of her. The precious, vivacious, little Piddi who would run to us wagging her tail, whose eyes lit up when she saw Lucky.
Maybe, she was the Barkat I always wanted. She is the Barkat who will stay in my heart, forever.
World of Shubhika 
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