Stop Cruelty on Cats

Prof. M Zahidul Haque

By Prof. M Zahidul Haque

Dateline: Dhaka –News Desk

Breaking news tears through the alleys tonight.

Cat’s eye—gouged out!

The suspect isn’t a monster from myths,

but a human,

Assuming, it was for black magic!

Elsewhere, a ghastly lesson unfolds

A cat slaughtered, her body torn,

her stomach torn open to justify suspicion—

a fish, allegedly stolen.

The hand that did it, a woman,

once perhaps a friend, now lost in anger’s shadow.

Yet beyond the blood and headlines

live other cats—

the fortunate few—

cradled by kind hands,

fed, brushed, loved,

purring in the small mercies of safe homes.

But this city’s caution grows cold.

Not even scraps make their way to the bins now.

Fear and indifference outpace compassion;

cats prowl hungry, seeking mercy

in alleyways that no longer care.

There is no hotline for feline complaints,

no reporter to tally sleepless, suffering nights.

Their wounds remain uncounted, their hunger unspoken—

their stories only surface in the occasional tearful witness!

To the readers, to the citizens, to us—

Can we not pause,

still our ticking clocks for a moment,

glance into the eyes of these silent souls?

A look may teach us—

they, too, know pain, hope, and longing.

In every act of kindness,

a bowl of food, a word gentle and true,

we find both remedy and redemption.

Let Dhaka be a city that remembers

compassion, even when memory is hard.

Stop cruelty. Start care.

Let this breaking news end

with hope restored—one cat, one act, one heart at a time!

(Prof. M Zahidul Haque is a regular contributor to the GREENWATCH, Dhaka)