Leena Tandon, an associate director by profession who has worked on films like Once Upon A Time In Mumbai Dobara, 14 Phere, Prassthanamm to name a few, has now turned into a social worker. Leena founded an NGO for animals called 'House of Paws' in 2019 to help the voiceless. With a team of passionate animal lovers, Zarina Wahab and Deepraj Rana joined Leena as co-founders to help the needy animals. 

Now, in an exclusive chat with PeepingMoon, Leena talked about how her journey as an animal lover and helper started and how she overcame the challenge that came her way. 

Excerpts from the interview: 

What prompted you to start House of Paws? 

When I moved to Bombay 14 years ago, I started rescuing dogs. Then in 2010, someone dumped a pregnant dog in my building and she gave 11 puppies so I started feeding them. So, basically, my journey started from there. Then 3 years back, I picked up a puppy from the road that was completely paralyzed from the back. That’s when I realized that I’ve to start an NGO. So, we’ve just picked up land to shelter dogs. 

How do you manage your direction career with the NGO? 

After a lot of years, I’ve finally put my foot down and stopped traveling also because I’ve 7 dogs at home and 51 at my shelter. I have been an associate director for the past 10 years and now I’ve finally put my foot down and taken a job so that I don’t have to travel again and again. It’s a difficult thing to do but I have a caretaker so she’s pretty good. 

How did Deepraj Rana and Zarina Wahab come on-board as co-founders? 

They’re my family friends and I’ve known them for almost 12-13 years. So, it was a joint initiative because they’ve also been animal lovers. Even they have pets at home. They always wanted to do something for animals so we collectively made this decision to pick up a land and help these animals out. 

The pandemic was the most difficult time for the animals. How did you manage? 

For people who are animal lovers, it is easier to explain them but for people who don’t understand the love for animals, it’s very difficult. During the pandemic, we had 250-300 dogs only in Bombay dumped because WHO put up the hoarding that they can get COVID. People would hit them on the road and kick them and it wasn’t the right thing. It’s a sad world.