Our Story
Animal Angels was started in 2003 as a lone attempt by Mrs.Minal Lonkar - Kavishwaralong with other likeminded people who believed in the healing power of pets. Her lovefor animals and her academic background in mental health gave her a unique outlook oftreating patients with animals as the agents for change. For a girl with short stature, Minalwas determined and full of faith in the healing power of pets.
Her first research work on animals as therapist aides began on a project initiated byMrs.Shyamashree Bhosle, Principal of 'Dharmaveer Anand Dhige Jidd Special School'.
Minal had completed master in clinical psychology when she was contacted by her mentorand friend, Ms. Kshitija Koppal. They had been approached by a school to train a dog. Thatschoolwas TMC’s Dharmaveer Anand Dhige Jidd Special School', a school for children withmental retardation and physical disabilities. The principal of the school Mrs. ShyamashreeBhosle had a vision to implement what no other government school had ever done before.She wanted to train a dog for the mentally challenged children at the school. Kshitija Koppalbeing a renowned Canine Behavior Counselor and a dog trainer was roped in to select andtrain a dog for the school. Kshitija picked up a loving little pup called ‘Kutty’ from a familyin Bangalore. She was named Kutty as she was the youngest in her litter (Kutty meansyoungest in Tamil language). Minal, being a psychologist believed that since the school wasfor mentally challenged children, the dog could be trained properly to be more than just acompanion for these children. She delved into the possibilities of training Kutty as a ‘therapydog’. Till then this subject was unheard of by most people in India. She researched thissubject and found out that she was of the right background to implement this projectof ‘Animal Assisted Therapy’. She further learned and trained Kutty to be a ‘TherapyDog’. Since this kind of work was not done before in India, she decided to documentedthe findings of her work. Kutty was trained by Minal in the school itself which created adeeper bond between the children and Kutty. She soon began noticing changes that therapydog ‘Kutty’ brought about in the children. The children were emotional more tolerance, theirmotor skills and their attention span improved, children who were thought to be speechdeficit spoke their first words to Kutty, children would come to school just to be with Kutty and many such inspiring instances were observed during the project. She also observedthat these children who were socially aloof began showing signs of socializing as Kutty gavethem unconditional acceptance which the society could not.
The success of this project led her to explore more avenues of implementing animal therapyin various areas of mental health and to reach out to the common man with this wonderful therapy. |