Graphic Videos Uncover Secret Animal Dognappings and Abuse at Pakistani University

Animal lovers in the twin cities congregated at Islamabad Press Club yesterday afternoon to protest against Doctor of Veterinary Medicine (DVM) schools after learning that their students have been kidnapping healthy dogs and experimenting and operating on them in utterly inhumane, unethical, and spine-chilling conditions.

The protesters demanded that Pakistani veterinary schools follow international ethical academic guidelines, which, include that:

“Universities MUST work with shelters and clinics to acquire specimens that actually need surgery so it is beneficial to both senior students and the shelters/clinics [sic];

Practice anatomy on dummies or cadavers acquired by vet clinics and shelters. NEVER make students catch a stray dog for their practicals”.

United Stray Animals Rescue also participated in the protest and posted some of the demands on its Facebook page yesterday, according to which DVM schools in Pakistan should contact local animal shelters and NGO’s with Trap-Neuter-Vaccinate-Return (TNVR) programs to obtain animals for academic purposes instead of kidnapping and abusing them.

Footage obtained from the premises of Pir Mehr Ali Shah Arid Agriculture University, Rawalpindi (PMAS-AAUR) last week showed several dogs with their mouths and limbs tied up, lying in pools of blood and excreta after they were operated upon without anesthesia, and left cut open and without post-op care. Many of the dogs were left to suffer in filthy conditions after botched surgeries by students.

Among the whistle blowers were Navida Asim, a housewife residing in I/8-1, Islamabad, who feeds stray cats and dogs, and takes care of their medical needs, including vaccinations. Last week, she noticed that one of her healthy and vaccinated stray female dogs, Bubble, whom she had hand-reared and fed for 11 months, was missing. Upon investigating in Mughal Market, she learned from eye-witnesses that two young men in white lab coats on a motorbike had baited her dog, put an iron chain around her neck, and dragged her away with it.

“When poor Bubble tripped over the chain, they stopped to bind her muzzle and limbs with it and drove away with her. Footage from Safe City CCTVs showed us that the dognappers were headed toward Rawalpindi,” Navida told this scribe.

She added that further personal investigations led her to an insider at PMAS-AAUR who disclosed that several dogs had been brought to the university a day ago to be experimented upon by students at the Faculty of Veterinary and Animal Sciences (FV & AS).

Bubble had been missing for two days by then and Navida enlisted the help of the founder of Critter’s Ark Welfare Organization (CAWO), Anila Umair; CAWO worker, Sana Raja; the founder of Animals Rescue and Adoption Islamabad, Salman, and his assistant Pareshay to help her.

Anila Umair, a fiercely active animal rescuer known for saving several animals from abominable conditions at the pet market at Gordon College Chowk, Rawalpindi told ProPakistani that when she reached out to the Capital Development Authority (CDA) about the recent disappearance of dogs in Islamabad, it assured her that it was not involved in poisoning street dogs (under court orders) and was not responsible for the missing dogs.

She said that the lab coats of the dognappers had been identified as the PMAS-AAUR FV & AS uniform, which had helped the team of animal rescuers trace them to the university. Her investigation also led to a tip that Bubbles had been operated upon on Thursday.

Anila mentioned that she and her team work as volunteers with the Commissioner of Rawalpindi, for which they had permit cards that allow them access to certain places for their work. She managed to convince the university’s gatekeepers to let them inside to check on Bubble on Thursday night. Inside, they witnessed gruesome scenes of nearly 16 dogs who were mutilated, tied up, and suffering in the laboratory.

“Many of them were not even stitched up properly and were gagged and bound. They were screaming in pain,” Navida recalled.

Anila said,

We spotted a mother dog with leaking teats and bleeding stitches in a fragile condition. Others were also butchered, bleeding and unconscious, tied up, and in horrible pain.

Warning: This video contains graphic content.

Navida stated that after taking photographs and videos of the horrors there, they argued with the people in the lab about the grotesque conditions in which the dogs were, which included cutting them open without anesthesia, binding their muzzles that would make them vomit in their own mouths and inhaling or ingesting it, which would lead to their deaths.

“The people there told us that they are final year ‘medical students’ training to become doctors, and that they need the dogs to learn how to perform surgeries,” Navida continued.

After finding Bubble, Anila told the students that Bubble is from a community where the stray dogs are fed, cared for, neutered/spayed, and vaccinated, which does not render them as open targets to be kidnapped and treated as ‘lab rats and guinea pigs’. When she asked about the surgeries and procedures performed on the animals they had seen, a man called ‘Dr. Faisal’ told her that all the dogs had undergone “intestine surgery for examination”.

“Some of the teachers and doctors returned to the campus and attempted to calm us down. They took us away to an office to talk about it. They apologized for the situation, saying it would not be repeated, and promised to treat our dogs and return them to us. They said that we were welcome to come and visit the department to check up on the condition of the dogs and invited us to come the next day as well” Navida said.

Anila added that she and her team offered them the suggestion of working with animal rescue and welfare organizations to neuter, spay, and vaccinate stray animals.

“This will help the stray animals and various communities,” she urged and questioned that when the same is not done to humans, why voiceless and defenseless street animals are subjected to such cruelty.

“Veterinary doctors know that major surgeries have high chances of subsequent death. Yet, they constitute teams of students to kidnap animals on the streets. These students are told to operate on the animals and are warned that if the animals survive, they get marks but if the animals die, the students ‘fail the practical test’. This is cruelty,” Anila said.

She explained to the teachers that a better alternative is to help animal welfare through the TNVR program which also includes the same requirement of proper anesthetizing, checking stitches, and post-op care that the students need to perform.

Anila said that they seemed to agree with her and asked her to collaborate with the FV & AS to teach them these ethics and policies in workshops so that they may be followed in the department.

“However, on Friday morning, the university guards and officials refused to recognize us and asked us who we were to be involved in PMAS-AAUR’s affairs. We were told by Dean Arfan Yousaf that the university could do whatever it wanted to with the dogs,” Navida revealed.

After waiting for almost four hours at the university’s security office and not making any headway, Navida and the animal rescuers decided to strategize their mission.

Anila said,

It’s unethical and cruel. These criminal practices are taking place all over Pakistan and Punjab. As the citizens of an Islamic country, we cannot even hurt an ant.

Anila then proceeded to take the matter up with the Commissioner of Rawalpindi, who, she said, spoke to the PMAS-AAUR Registrar, Muhammad Aqeel Sultan, and Vice-Chancellor (VC), Dr. Qamar uz Zaman, and advised them to refrain from abusing stray animals and option for dummies and TNVR programs. He arranged a meeting for her team with the Registrar on Monday, 6 June, because the VC was said to be in Canada.

She said that her meeting with the Registrar was cordial and he apologized for the state of affairs at the university. She said that he expressed the desire to rectify it with the help of her team. The VC informed the Registrar that he would return to Pakistan on 15 June and would meet the team, as stated by Anila. She said that the VC asked her to identify the proper policies, laws, and SOPs for the ethical DVM practicals that the university would be sure to adhere to in the future while abolishing the ongoing practices.

Anila highlighted that although she and her associates are compiling the required policies, she is still waiting for an official statement from PMAS-AAUR on paper in this regard and has chosen not to base her work in this regard on oral conversations.

On Friday night, Navida, Anila, and the other animal rescuers involved in the case shared all the footage of the atrocities at the FV & AS on various social media platforms to raise the issue and their helplessness.

Anila mentioned that it went viral and also resulted in students exposing similar atrocities at other Pakistani DVM schools, including Riphah College of Veterinary Sciences in Lahore and the experimental laboratory at the Zoology department of COMSATS University, Lahore, on social media.

Warning: This video contains graphic content.

She claimed that some DVM departments were upset by the revelation and told her that they want to end such practices and commended her efforts. She added that other DVM departments told her that these practices are essential to training future veterinarians, to which she responded that alternatives must be considered because there is no difference between a pet and a stray animal, and stray animals must not be sacrificed to learn how to treat a pet”.

Navida also mentioned that another protest against cruel experiments on stray animals will be staged in Islamabad after nine days.

ProPakistani has reached out to the Registrar PMAS-AAUR for comment but is yet to receive a response.


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