Union Women and Child Development Minister Maneka Gandhi inaugurated the state’s first animal birth control centre (ABC) at Kedarpuram . The centre will take up birth control measures with stray dogs the population of which has been rising in the city and the state.

The DMC took the help of an NGO run by Maneka Gandhi to start the centre. After Dehradun, the centres will be set up in Nainital and Mussoorie and other five municipal corporations in Haridwar, Haldwani, Kashipur, Haldwani and Roorkee.

• The Department of Urban Development has sanctioned Rs 2 crore to set up the centres. Later, Maneka visited the city office of the BJP where she felicitated freedom fighters, including Paripoornand Painuli, Bhim Sen Bhatia and Ram Pratap Bahuguna.

•   The centre will have 72 Dog kennels for housing dogs as well as their treatment & vaccination post-surgery. There will also be 4 staff quarters within the premises. This facility will also have provision of adopting the stray dogs post-surgery.
  

• The project which has cost about 1.5 crore took more than a year in its development but is being seen as a good initiative by the residents of the city who feel that dog menace has considerably increased in the city.