BY HARIHARSINGH RATHOUR

DAILEKH, Oct 22 - When dogs elsewhere were getting gentle caresses from humans and were being fed delicacies, the stray dogs of Narayan Municipality area in Dailekh district were being hounded by a cruel fate.
After municipality staff began poisoning the stray dogs to death on the first day of Tihar and even into Kukur Tihar--the second day of the second greatest Nepalese festival --the otherwise indifferent locals could not remain unmoved. On the second day of Tihar, dogs in Nepal are adorned with flower garlands around the neck and red tika on the forehead. They are then offered a great meal and then ritually worshipped.

"Appalled by the merciless despatching of the dogs by the drunken municipality sweepers, local women hurried indoors to avoid the sorry spectacle," said Nanda Bahadur Shrestha, who owns a radio repair stall at Purano bazaar.

According to him, the sweepers killed 23 dogs the previous day. "On Kukur Tihar also, they gave poisoned meat to the dogs and mercilessly hammered the already unconscious animals to death, just as on the previous day." Altogether, five dozen of them were killed in the two days.

As municipality staff were busy loading the dead and dying dogs unto a tractor, the locals felt quite uncomfortable about such doings during Tihar time. Dambar Thapa, proprietor of a medical dispensary, said that rabies could be contracted as the number of passers-by bitten by dogs had increased lately.

However, no such cases have been diagnosed so far even as the slaughter of stray dogs was being carried out for fear of the disease. The District Hospital also confirmed this.

The municipality had issued a public notice a week ago informing the locals to keep their pet dogs inside their houses. "But we didn't give any order to kill the stray dogs on Kukur Tihar," said Nirak Rawal, a junior official at the municipality.

After the killing of stray dogs on the very first day evoked wide condemnation, Birendra Dev Bharati, executive officer at the municipality, had given directives to do the killing only after the festival. But as soon as he left to celebrate Tihar, the inebriated sweepers were found roaming the localities armed with poison bottles and pieces of meat.

And now, passers-by have been compelled to cover their noses, as the canine carcasses have been dumped at a stream along the main road near a local campus.