Friday, June 30, 2006

Vijayan's Rani

Rani, the stray featured in the photograph alongside was run over in the most terrible manner outside the VSNL building at Fountain by a taxi and then a BEST bus last Monday. Vijayan, her owner called us in a panic and our volunteer Prerna reached there in 10 minutes to take her to the WSD kennels. She had bled excessively and thus could not make it.

Rani was Vijayan's shadow and used to live with him outside the Standard Chartered bank at Fountain where he polishes shoes. On that fateful day, she had followed him when he was on his way to the toilet across the street.

The sweet and gentle Rani was just two and half years old. If you passed by the Standard Chartered bank at Fountain you would have seen her perched up on Vijayan's boot polish dabba. Vijayan loved her with all his heart and she had a 'chaap' of belonging to a boot-polishwala as instead of a belt, she has a shoe lace tied around her neck. Vijayan who was acknowledged as a 'Stray Dog Saviour' by
WSD on Stray Dog Day had proudly brought her along to the function and she had shared the limelight with him on stage.
Rani was also special to everyone at WSD. As WSD's Rani had become old (she passed away later), Vijayan's Rani took over the mantle of being the demo dog at WSD' s SOS workshops. This was already a second life for Vijayan's Rani who had been earlier cured by WSD of paralysis when she was a puppy. Sadly, she couldn't get a third life.

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