Columnist in a soup over dog poo

Tavleen Singh refuses to submit to BMC’s ‘half-baked and stupid’ law

MUMBAI: Taking your dog out for a walk got a little complicated in December after the BMC decided to implement the cleanliness and sanitation bylaws 2006. The bylaws make a pet owner responsible for clearing any poo that may land on Mumbai’s pavements.

The latest person to be fined under this rule is noted columnist Tavleen Singh, who was asked by the BMC on Thursday to pay up Rs500 for letting her pet defecate on Marine Drive.

But the attempt to enforce the rule resulted in an altercation between Singh and civic officials, who later lodged a complaint against her at the Marine Drive police station.

Vijay Jadhav, an official of the ‘A’ ward, said, “She has done this at least four times in the last two months. Despite warnings she kept threatening us with dire consequences and refusing to pay the paltry fine.”

But Singh said it was not the amount of the fine that drove her to this act of ‘civil disobedience’. “It is a conscious objection to a half-baked, stupid law,” she told DNA. “This law is just like treating a cancer patient with mouth-to-mouth resuscitation.”

She said the civic authorities have failed to implement the law rigorously in other parts of the city and are making scapegoats of the people on Marine Drive to “show the world that they are working”.

“If my dog poos beyond Marine Drive, it is okay with the BMC?” Singh said. “What kind of discrimination is this? Why are they implementing this law only in ‘A’ ward, harassing 20-odd dog owners every morning? What are they trying to show?”

Singh added that in cities like Paris and New York, authorities provide special plastic bags to dog owners so that the faeces can be easily picked up and disposed of. 

“But Mumbai Municipal Commissioner Johny Joseph continues to implement this stupid law without providing for dustbins and plastic bags,” she said.

Joseph, however, said the law is being “seriously implemented”. “But it is like traffic: if the police are there, you will be caught; else you go scot-free. But we have to pay. Also, we have spent crores of rupees beautifying Marine Drive, so we have to give it special preference.”

Residents of the area endorsed Joseph’s sentiments. “What she has done is wrong,” said Chandresh Shah of the Marine Drive Residents’ Association. “Almost Rs130 crore has been spent on beautification of the drive, so why should the BMC not pay extra attention to this area?”