The photographs of pellet wounds on people in Kashmir have been all over the papers. Many people with multiple pellets on their faces have had to be hospitalised. No one can die—or so we are told—of a pellet wound, so they have been used liberally during the recent riots in Kashmir. According to the newspapers, the pellet guns used in the protests are said to be the ones normally used to shoot partridges and quails

This is not my first encounter with air/pellet guns. I have been seeing them for years and I started campaigning against them in the 90s—even went to the court to have them banned. I won the case after the airgun industry derailed the case for many years—first approaching the Home Ministry and then, when that did not work, accusing me of influencing the case by writing an article in some obscure paper. They lost that case, but it took a decade. Then they went for a stay and we fought that.

Attacks on animals

I started looking into this matter, thirty years ago, when birds and squirrels started coming to my hospital with pellet wounds. We could barely save 10 percent of these wounded and suffering creatures. Most of them were unconscious when they came to us and gangrene had spread from the wounds. They had been hit for fun, by children whose parents had been wicked enough to buy them airguns as toys.

Pellet guns are not toys. They are real guns which use pellets, instead of bullets, but the harm they inflict is almost the same. No child will use an airgun on a drawing room vase or a stone. They are always used on living beings. Either the child will fire upon poor people, as they pass by his house, and then hide. Or they are used on small animals and birds. They are neither used against pets as they are exclusively reserved for defenceless urban creatures that have no one to help them—sparrows, crows, kites, parakeets, squirrels, monkeys and feral cats.

Every now and then someone picks up a little creature, collapsed on the ground with pain and infection, and brings it to us. Few birds can survive fractured bones. In cats, the pellet often gets stuck in a bone and is difficult to remove. Or the pellet tears through the intestine and internal blood loss kills the animal after days of suffering. Or it hits the head sending the animal into a coma.

In England, attacks on animals take place mainly in summer when children have holidays and little to do. In summer of 2011, the Royal Society for the Prevention of Cruelty (RSPCA) to Animals, a charity operating in England and Wales that promotes animal welfare, tended to 567 complaints of air gun incidents. This doubled in summer 2012. Cats were the most frequent victims of air gun attacks, but dogs, birds and wildlife were victims too. The RSPCA believes many cases go unreported, or some owners may never know what has happened to their pet, as injured animals usually look for a quiet sheltered area to die.Therefore, these incidents may only be the tip of the iceberg.

Gun control

Over the years the severity of injuries, inflicted by air guns, has increased dramatically. Modern air guns have immense power and the pellets are not embedded on the skin but pass through the body, smashing bones to smithereens. Air gun injuries are becoming increasingly more difficult for vets to treat. Almost half of all animals, shot by airgun snipers, die from their wounds, compared to 11 percent in the 1990s. Broken legs lead to amputation—paralysis when the pellet narrowly misses the spine. Animals, too old to have the pellets removed, limp along till they die

Recently, an orangutan on a palm oil plantation in Borneo was found after being shot with 40 air-rifle pellets. The Borneo Orangutan Survival Foundation in Nyaru Menteng received the adult female in critical condition, with X-rays showing “10 pellets in the head, 8 pellets in the left leg and pelvis, 18 pellets in the right leg and pelvis, as well as six pellets in the chest and right hand.” She had maggots crawling in her open wounds, and she suffered from malnutrition. Experts estimate that her wounds were just three days old. In spite of surgery, she died.

A new law came in 2012, in Great Britain, to stop childrenunder 18 from accessing air guns and by fining owners upto £1,000 if they allowed their children to use their guns. This brought the abuse down by half, but now 86 percent of vets are demanding a change in the law to restrict the sale and use of air weapons, which can be bought without any form of licence. Scotland has made it illegal to own an airgun without a permit and campaigners are asking England and Wales to follow suit. According to the law in the US, using airguns on animals is considered a felony under state law. Air-powered weapons, such as pellet guns, are not allowed to be used within city limits.

Reforms in India

When the current Indian government formed in 2014, the home ministry started an exercise to reform the Arms Rules. Plenty of evidence was given to them to put controls on airguns. The airgun industry and Rifle Association, headed by ex-Maharajahs and poachers, lobbied hugely—even with me—to not put any controls on airguns as this was a “sport”.

However, I am happy to say that the Rules, tabled in Indian Parliament in August, are very clear: Section 84 says that the manufacture and sale of air weapons, including paintball markers or guns, irrespective of the muzzle energy, calibre, or bore, shall be subject to licencing—whether for manufacture, proof test, transfer, sale or keeping. The keeping, sale and transfer can only be done through authorised arms dealers. Anyone buying them has to give identification and proof of residence. The seller or dealer has to keep a stock register and names and addresses of all the people he has sold it to, along with their details.

No toy shops can sell it to young people and register all those who have bought a gun, so that if any more incidents on animals take place, there exists records to track down people in the area. Finally, we have acknowledged the massive killings done by these “toys” and the fact that these children and their mad parents are probably a danger to humans as well.

If you know of any shops selling airguns of any kind, let me know.

 To join the animal welfare movement contact [email protected], www.peopleforanimalsindia.org