Simply surviving on the busy streets is an everyday struggle for homeless cats and dogs, but at In Defense of Animals India, we’re doing everything we can to help them, and to change attitudes about them. Now, we’re celebrating a major gift that’s going to help us save more lives at our Lonavala Center!

The Lonavala Center is one of four that we operate to provide care and medical treatment to animals in need in India. It was opened 10 years ago after one of our longtime supporters moved to Lonavala from Mumbai and was appalled by the conditions she found homeless dogs suffering in.

Since then, we’ve moved from a small bungalow where we started to a permanent facility set up by the Lonavala Municipal Council, and we have been able to help so many animals in need in the area!

Some are homeless and reported by kind strangers, others have regular caretakers who want to find them help. Many of them are sick or injured and would suffer or die without our intervention.

Countless animals rely on the services we’re able to provide with our mobile vet clinic.

Now, however, we’ve gotten a major boost in our ability to assist them after receiving a new van, which was generously donated by Khaleel S. Sulaiman in loving memory of his parents, Siddick and Shabanu S. Sulaiman.

Our newly donated mobile vet clinic for Lonavala.

This van replaces our old one which served thousands of animals before succumbing to the rough roads it traveled over. It will be used as our newest mobile vet clinic, which will ensure our ability to assist animals in need in the Khandala Lonavala region, which is about two hours outside of Mumbai.

Not only will this van help us provide treatment right on the spot for cats and dogs who need help, it will also be used as an ambulance to transport both big and small animals in need of more serious medical treatment to the appropriate center.

Being in a rural area, our Lonavala Center also often receives calls about cows, ponies and donkeys in distress, and this mobile vet clinic will be used to bring them to Mumbai, where they need to be brought to be treated.

Our mobile vet clinics are critical to what we do, and help well over 100 animals in need every single month in India.

While our centers have a large capacity to take in and care for sick and injured animals, the number who need our help is always bigger. Serious cases in our care can take months to recover and we are sometimes forced to stop admitting animals until we can release others. Turning them away is heartbreaking because they have nowhere else to go.

However, our mobile vet clinics, which are operated by qualified staff and stocked with medicine by you, our kind supporters, allow us to treat animals with minor injuries and illnesses wherever they are. This helps prevent overcrowding at our centers and reduces their stress, which can help them get better faster.

Our very own Sudnya Patkar, Secretary of In Defense of Animals India, explains, “Our experience is that dogs and cats recover faster on the road, as they are in their own environment, they are happier than being cooped up in kennels. For animals requiring daily care and treatment this option is not available, but for those with minor ailments, the mobile clinics are a huge boon.”

We give animal caretakers follow-up medication, and if animals have no one to look after them, our mobile vet clinic team follows up until the patient has fully recovered.

There are an overwhelming number of animals who rely on us for help every single day, but you can make a significant difference for them by supporting our life-saving work. Please help us save more animals by making a donation. Thank you.