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At any time, Sanam Karunakar’s "Perfect Pooch” boarding service that she runs with husband Suraj can provide care for up to a dozen canines while their "pet parents” are away at work, or on vacation, or just want time away from their pets. The doggy-day-care also provides overnight boarding facilities to casual walk-in clients. Some neighbors ask them to look after their pets while they have a pooja in their home or while their homes are being fumigated for pests. "We never say no,” Sanam informed us over tea and biscuits on January 26, 2019 at their Chandivali home-cum-canine day care. Around us pranced four enthusiastic "canine clients,” Rafa, a boxer, Rocco, a German shepherd, Asha, an "Indian” breed, and Troy, a Labrador. Sarah, a beagle and Star, also a Labrador were to check in the next day.
"We provide lots of love and attention in a safe, home environment,” said Sanam. Suraj even provides pickup and drop off service for the pooches. Timings for food and walks are customized for each canine paying guest. Boarding charges are Rs 1,000 per night. The couple has hired two local lads to assist them. The Karunakars also teach humans how to impart good manners to their canines, decode canine behavior, provide toilet-training, interaction with other dogs, "and in general have a good time with them,” said Sanam. Admission criteria to Perfect Pooch are somewhat stringent, but necessary: screening for friendliness by the Karunakars at a home visit; a trial stay for a couple of hours a day; evidence of up-to-date vaccination shots; copies of medical certificates; inspections for fleas. "But I do not pamper them… I am strict with them…Do you see them climbing on the sofa? No!” she smiled.

 

 

 

 

 

The duo completed a 21-day dog training course with Durham, UK-based dog behaviorist and writer John Rogerson in Lonavala. The Karunakars’ dream of having a farm in Karjat on the outskirts of Bombay where their live-in canine guests could roam free had to be shelved on deeper thought: Sanam needed to be near sound medical facilities in case of any eventuality. "We take great pride in maintaining long-term, interactive relationships with our ever-expanding network of dog owners and their pooches,” states their website.
Sanam wants to "hopefully write a book” about the ups and downs in her life. She describes herself as "moody, but fond of writing…and I will do it someday.” She has started writing anecdotes about raising her son Rayaan on her blog "Mama on wheels.” Paralyzed chest down due to an accident at age 16, the teenager who "always wanted to be a vet (veterinary surgeon),” is now 40.
A 1995 car crash on the Poona-Bombay highway had left Sanam and her sister Ayesha, then 13, orphaned.  While her sister escaped with bruises, Sanam suffered an injury to her spinal cord. Maternal grandmother Amy Kapadia was the girls’ carer after their parents Zarine and Rusi Rabadi passed away. "We never found our dog again…maybe he walked away, maybe he died,” says Sanam of the Doberman Ebony, the fifth passenger in that Maruti 800 car. 
Would she like an assist-dog? canine behaviorist Shirin Merchant offered Sanam after reading about her grit in a 2008 article in the Bombay Times. Magic, a black Labrador was Sanam’s first and only assist-dog. Merchant taught her how to be self-sufficient with Magic’s help over a six-month period. "I would have to be dependent on him to pick up my pillow if it rolled off my bed, fetch the TV remote control, even turn the specially placed light switches on and off,” said the canine fan. It was Merchant who put the seed in Sanam and Suraj’s mind to formalize their existing canine care business into Perfect Pooch. 
"Sanam is such a positive person…I have rarely heard her complain despite the difficulties she has been through…It is a privilege to have been part of her journey,” Merchant told Parsiana on January 18. Having a human carer is not the same as having an assist-dog, believes Merchant. If a person with a disability drops something repeatedly for instance, a human carer would sooner or later get fed up. A dog on the contrary would wait to pick up the dropped article, Merchant said.
What gives Sanam her strength? "My dogs, and this man,” she said, pointing with her chin towards Suraj. In the course of our conversation, Sanam once signaled to him with a look. Suraj was on his feet in a jiffy. Wordlessly he adjusted the leg rest on her "90-kilo wheelchair” from the horizontal to the vertical position.

 

 

 

 

 

 

"Ours is a very filmy love story,” she smiled. Four years after her accident, of which 11 months were spent at The B. D. Petit Parsee General Hospital, Sanam was ready to meet the world again. School friend Vinita Engineer (now Tampal) gave Sanam, then 20 and wheelchair bound, the number of "this cute boy who lived opposite Malcolm Baug” and she called him, giving her name as "Priya.” Within a few months of chatting over landlines in those pre-cell phone days, Suraj asked to meet her. "Havvé tau patti gayu (now the game is up),” she thought to herself, fearing that she would have to face up to telling the young man about her physical condition. "He didn’t believe me when I told him I was wheelchair bound… ‘You have already lied to me about your name,’ he said,” Sanam reminisced. And one day, he was at her home, "just like that… standing at the foot of my bed while I was chatting with friends.” And so began a three-year courtship, after which he popped the question. He would carry her up and down from her second floor Jaiji Terrace flat at Sleater Road when the lift was not operational, she recalled. "Of course I was lighter then,” she jokes. Unlike Sanam, Suraj did not have dogs while growing up but once he met her, he realized the joys of dog ownership, he told us.
Ayesha and Suraj’s parents had objections to their union, so they married on the quiet in late 2003. "For two years nobody knew… he would come over to Jaiji Terrace, spend the day and go to his night shift job at a call center,” she said. The game was up when a friend of Ayesha’s told her she read about Sanam’s marriage in Parsiana! Almost in parallel, a bag of Suraj’s misplaced papers was returned to his mother with the marriage certificate in it. "All is well now with his family, and with Ayesha,” said Sanam, adding that they had their wedding reception two years after they tied the knot.
"I miss many things… I wish I could cycle with Rayaan… If I were fully mobile, I would take him out camping,” stated Sanam. The lad turned six on March 1, 2019. "When we thought we were ready, we approached a few IVF (in-vitro fertilization) clinics and after understanding my case, the doctors thought it would be extremely risky for me to get pregnant because I had no motor function below my chest level,” Sanam disclosed to on-line portal "First Moms Club” in May 2017. Turned down by adoption agencies who "thought I would be unfit to be a mother due to my disability,” the couple decided on surrogate parenthood. 
Suffering from a dislocated left hip and cellulitis now, Sanam said, "Some days I am okay and some days I am not and cannot take him out.” There are mornings when she wishes she could get out of her wheelchair and pull her son off his bed and push him into the bathroom so that he is not late for school. 
"I believe in the faith…I wear my sudreh-kusti,” said Sanam. "I’ve taught Rayaan Ashem Vohu and Yatha Ahu Variyo.” The lad also "prays to Ganpati (as) we bring Ganesha home every year…I believe in one supreme power but I’m a very proud Zoroastrian. I don’t think I would be where I am without the help of my community and all the donations I received when I was fighting for survival, and receive, until now.” She particularly acknowledged the financial assistance of The WZO (World Zoroastrian Organisation) Trust Funds. "This wheelchair is also thanks to Scylla Vatcha,” she said, referring to the philanthropist as "an angel.”
"I try to do whatever I can for Rayaan…I get stressed and anxious…about finances…about the future… about how we will manage… Suraj is the positive one,” said Sanam. He only looks at her with a benign smile, eyes alight.