Before the market opens, Dr. Milli has already done a full round: the temple steps, the taxi stand, the alley behind the bakery. Her patients are the town street dogs, and her colleagues are the shopkeepers who feed them.

What looks like charity is actually infrastructure - vaccination rounds, sterilization drives, and a mental map of every animal in a two-kilometre radius.

She keeps a notebook of names. Most dogs have three: one from the monks, one from the tourists, one from the chai stall.

“Every lane has a dog, and every dog has three names. I try to learn all of them.”

— Dr. Milli