Animal Welfare Organisations

Animal Welfare Organisations

Animal welfare organizations are the group of people concerned with the health, safety and psychological wellness of animals. They include animal rescue groups which help animals in distress, and others which help animals suffering from some epidemic. In this section we will study about some of them.

Blue Cross

Blue Cross is a registered animal welfare charity in the United Kingdom, founded in 1897 as ‘Our Dumb Friends League’. The vision of this charity is that every pet will enjoy a healthy life in a happy home. The charity provides support for pet owners who cannot afford private veterinary treatment, helps to find homes for unwanted animals, and educates the public in the responsibilities of animal ownership.

Blue cross was founded to care for working horses on the streets of London, UK. It opened its first animal hospital, in Victoria, London, on 15May 1906.

Captain V. Sundaram founded the Blue Cross of India, the largest animal welfare organization of Asia in Chennai in the year 1959. He was an Indian pilot and animal welfare activist. Now, Blue Cross of India is country’s largest animal welfare organizations and it runs several animal welfare events like pet adaptation and animal right awareness. Blue Cross of India has received several international and national awards. This organization is entirely looked after by volunteers. The main office is located at Guindy, Chennai, with all amenities like hospitals, shelters, ambulance services and animal birth controls, etc. Activities of the organization include, providing shelters, re-homing, adoption, animal birth control, maintaining hospitals and mobile dispensary and providing ambulance services.

CPCSEA

CPCSEA stands for ‘The Committee for the Purpose of Control and Supervision of Experiments on Animals’. It is a statutory committee set up under the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals Act, 1960. It has been functioning since 1991 to ensure that animals are not subjected to unnecessary suffering during experiments on them.

Objectives of CPCSEA

i. To avoid unnecessary pain before and after experiment.

ii. To promote the human care of animal used in experiments.

iii. To provide guidelines for animal housing, breeding and maintenances.

 iv. To promote the human care of animal used in biomedical and behavioural research and testing.

Functions of CPCSEA

i. Approval of animal house facilities.

ii. Permission for conducting experiments involving usage of animals

iii. Action against establishments in case of established violation

iv. Registration of establishments conducting animal experimentation or breeding of animals for this purpose.