Another Pune-base clinical psychologist, who has rushed to the city to help trauma victims, is Dr Meenal Lonkar Kavishwar, probably India’s only animal assisted therapist. Kavishwar has a team of 40 volunteers and trained dogs in her clinic Animal Angels Foundation. “We are in discussion with several hospitals, trying to set up a full-time free psychiatric counseling centre. Our work should begin by next week,” Kavishwar said.

After the 7/11 train blasts in Mumbai, Kavishwar had set up a similar platform with the Bombay Psychiatric Society, and treated nearly 40 patients with the help of animals.

“Animals provide immense comfort ¿ their touch is soothing and helps in instant catharsis. This kind of treatment is very common in other countries,” Kavishwar said. Her team includes clinical psychologist, physiotherapists and counselors as well as several volunteers from SNDT College. Her therapy dogs are specially trained.

Stressing on the importance of psychiatric counseling, Pradhan said, “This attack has been very severe since it went on for over 48 hours, unlike past terror attacks which lasted for just a couple of hours. People have seen gore in the places they frequent and that’s going to leave a deep scar. Most watched television non-stop for 2 days, and identified with the places that were attacked. I am anticipating innumerable trauma cases. It is critical to treat them now otherwise the damage could become embedded.”