DOGS WITH (S)WAG

Pumpkin the puppy loves pan pipes. There’s a yoyo-sized woofer that hangs from his collar, and plays tunes designed especially for dogs like him. The tunes have helped him get through Diwali without whimpering and hiding under the furniture.

“I introduced him to the woofer in September,” says Maneesha Yadav, 28, a marketing executive in Mumbai. “I heard that an NGO was distributing the gadgets, so I borrowed one. It worked so well I now plan to buy it.”

The Animals Matter To Me (AMTM) gadget is just one of the ways in which technology is coming to the rescue of canines, pet and stray. The woofer (with seven minutes of instrumental music available free online) helps calm ruffled nerves during a storm or festival.

Reflective collars are keeping animals from being hit by traffic at night. There’s even a new app that helps connect animal lovers with NGOs, vets, clinics – and blood donors.

The initiatives use technology as their base, and to raise funds and rope in talent.

AMTM founder Ganesh Nayak, for instance, teamed up with digital marketing agency Tonic Worldwide to create the woofer. “When everyone else was busy making merry during Diwali, I was always worried about my dogs,” he says.

He reached out to Pratik Hatankar, head of innovation and new initiatives at Tonic Worldwide. “Instead of posting on social media, we decided to do something about it,” Hatankar says.

Their innovation team came up with the idea of the woofer and tied up with musician Siddharth Basrur, who tested different kinds of instrumental music on 150 dogs at the AMTM rehab centre for stray animals and birds – a mix of bamboo, flute, water and pan pipes turned out to be most effective.

“The response has been encouraging,” says Nayak. “We’ve already got more than 1,200 inquiries from cities across India, and from the US, Hong Kong and Singapore.” The collar costs ₹2,500 but the free music can be played off a regular speaker too.

AMTM has since re-engineered the gadget to add GPS tracking to reduce the chances of a pet getting lost in the melee of processions or firecrackers.

LET IT WAG

Across Mumbai and Delhi, meanwhile, a two-month-old app called Let It Wag is helping connect animal lovers with vets,