Three sniffer dogs in tiger reserve Palamu are giving tough time to their handlers.
One handler Baldev Singh Chero was dragged by one of the three sniffer dogs Rani recently who fell on the metallic road and got his elbow and shoulder blade badly bruised, said D S Srivastava member state wild life board Ranchi.
The sniffer dogs get milk, mutton and rotis made of wheat. Another handler Nand Kishore Singh Chero said Rani gives more trouble as ‘She shows more tantrums than Krish and Tiger’.
All the three have been brought in from Bhopal.
The three sniffer dogs are Tiger, Krish and Rani. All are very ominous. One official of the Betla range told The Pioneer ‘Permit us to bring one of the three sniffer dogs to sniff you and then we will hide your note book Sir and then see how this sniffer dog retrieve your diary but let me tell you the diary will be bitten by the sniffer dog as any retrieved thing/article bears the wrath of the sniffer dog’.
Understandably The Pioneer did not hazard this risk.
Srivastava wanted that these three sniffer dogs be ‘set up’ in critical core area, Bareysarn and Betla instead of keeping the entire lot in
Betla.
The handlers do not buy this opinion of Srivastava.
Their contention is that these sniffer dogs are no sentinel but just sniff the crime and the criminal and hence their staying put in Betla is good.
The role of the sniffer dog starts after the commission of offence.
The wild life offender leaves behind chappal, chader, gamchha, topi which these sniffer dogs smell and then try to track down the offenders.
One other handler Bansi Yadav gave a narration as to how sniffer dog Krish sniffed a wild life offender, who was trying to hide himself in a dense bush and the sniffer dog was about to tear him apart, when the handler mustered all courage and tamed and contained the sniffer dog Krish.
All these three sniffer dogs are in good health and can make their handler run 7 to 8 Kms in a stretch.
The Betla based tiger reserve officials still mourn the death of another sniffer dog Tracy.
Srivastava reiterated ‘ What I want is that these sniffer dogs be not given luxury time as they are taken out from the kennel morning evening and this will surely impact their sniffing capability and so they must also be put to rigours of wild scenario in this tiger reserve’.