Ghaziabad civic body to make the city ‘rabies-free’ by 2030
The first centre near Hindon is operational since 2013 and the second is estimated to completed in another two months and cost about ₹1.4 crore
Ghaziabad: The Ghaziabad municipal corporation has planned to make its municipal area as ‘rabies-free’ city by 2023 with the help of two under construction animal birth control (ABC) centres in addition to the one already existing. The two are expected to boost the civic authority’s capacity to sterilise about 100 community dogs per day by mid-2025.
Officials said that they already have city’s first ABC near Hindon river that caters to sterilisation of about 10-15 community dogs per day. The construction work for a second centre near New Bus Adda is likely to complete in two months, and that will cater to sterilising about 40-45 community dogs a day.
“We had earlier also proposed for a third centre at Siddharth Vihar which is the biggest centre. It will cater to sterilisation of about 50 to 55 community dogs per day. This project’s cost is about ₹2.4 crore and it’s likely to complete in August or September, 2025. Once fully operational, all three centres will take up daily sterilisation and vaccination of about 100-110 community dogs,” said Dr Anuj Singh, corporation’s chief veterinary and social welfare officer.
The first centre near Hindon is operational since 2013 and the second is estimated to completed in another two months and cost about ₹1.4 crore.
Corporation officials said that they completed sterilisation of about 34,572 community dogs till November 25 (since 2013) and believe that the city has a population of about 55,000-60,000 community dogs under the GMC’s jurisdiction.
“We are expecting that two of the under-construction ABC centres will start functioning by September, 2025. We have also planned a programme that community dogs also get annual vaccination like pet dogs. Generally, the community dogs get vaccination when they arrive for birth-control procedure. However, we have planned to sterilise them annually afterwards. This way, we intend to make the entire city rabies-free by 2030,” Dr Singh added.
“Construction of the ABC centres is a step in the right direction. These were long demanded and should be expedited. Similar centres should come up in all the five corporation zones,” said Ruchin Mehra, an animal activist and a lawyer.
In September, 2023, the corporation along with the district health department identified 53 “high risk dog bite” zones across the district, with officials saying that their focus will be to boost sterilisation and vaccination of community dogs.
These zones cover major several residential sectors, said officials. For instance, the Vasundhara zone includes residential areas of Sector 16b, Sector 7, Sector 2, Sector 8 and Prahladgarhi. Likewise, Shipra Sun City zone includes areas of Shipra Sun City Royal Tower, Niti Khand 1, Manoj Vihar, Shakti Khand 4 and JJ cluster, they added.