India, Aug. 23 -- K itties rule the internet. Some are Reels stars. Some in Sydney and Istanbul have their own Google pins. Some make more money as influencers than humans. All cat content is good cat content (except, the 2019 musical, apparently). Naturally, mental-health counsellors are hoping their magic will work in therapy too. They're letting cats in, claws and all, to sessions. "Cats have been adopted by special-needs schools and centres, and have become a fixture of their programmes," says Minal Kavishwar, founder of the NGO Animal Angels Foundation, and Animal Angels Therapy Center. They're tiny, they keep themselves clean, they need less space and resources than dogs, they're not as loud either. But doggos, your jobs are safe, say animal behaviourists and mental health practitioners. Here's why. Animal Angels Foundation has trained and worked with therapy dogs since its inception in 2003. But over the last six years, they've been slowly incorporating cats into therapy sessions for children with behavioural issues, and adults who have anxiety, boundaries, and self-image challenges. They have three to four cats across their Mumbai, Pune and Bengaluru centers. Kavishwar's own indie, 16-year-old Cookie, worked with individuals who had severe anxiety before she retired. Mango, a Golden Persian, has been at the Mumbai centre for two years. Elsa, a Ragdoll Persian, and Minu, a Blue Persian, are currently being trained. "The nature of a cat is to not listen to you or react to things you say or do," Kavishwar says. So, when individuals with mental-health issues interact with them, they often project their own feelings onto the animal ('Maybe the cat doesn't like me', 'Maybe it's because there's something wrong with me'), which gives therapists something to work with. Aili Seghetti, a relationship and dating coach from Mumbai brings her 10-year-old indie, Mimi, to some sessions. Mimi doesn't let people pet her for too long. But when a client gets emotional, starts to cry or is visibly distressed, she'll hover gently, even climb onto their laps if they let her. Seghetti says that it becomes an opportunity to change the direction of the conversation. Cats score over dogs when dealing with humans on the autism spectrum. "Some people don't like the sound of barking, the sensation of being licked, or having a wet nose pushed into their palm," says Raj Mariwala, a canine and feline behaviourist and director at Mariwala Health Initiative, Mumbai. No fear of cats doing this. Therapy cats are best trained early - in the first eight to 10 weeks. But cat-training might be a euphemism. It's the humans who get trained to decode what felines like and dislike and tolerate. "So, it's not command-based training as with dogs." Training a dog for therapy takes between six and eight months. For cats, it can take a year or more, says Kavishwar. "You need to teach them to stay on a harness and expose them to different types of touch, smells, environments, car travel, new places and people - especially children - and sudden sounds and movements." Mariwala takes along her nine-year-old ginger cat, Namak, for palliative-care visits. He sits at the foot of a bed, waiting until the person is ready to give him attention. "He's used to the medical smells and the whirring of the machines - I can't do that with my other younger cats, Pingu and Shakira." But the biggest advantage that felines have over canines is the ability to sit in a patient's lap. "It's especially useful for senior citizens or bedridden patients who can't bend down to play with a dog," says Mariwala. And cats actively choose to be patient. "Mango worked with a child on the autism spectrum who was initially terrified of animals," recalls Kavishwar. "In the first session, the boy refused to be in the same room with Mango. He gradually grew curious and made sustained eye contact - a huge improvement. The entire time, you could sense that Mango was choosing to engage with him, not the other way around." Behaviourists are fighting the notion that cats are low-maintenance. And there's still a bit of the wild in them, says Amanda Tong, founder of The Animal Behaviour Academy in Mumbai. "They still possess hunting genes and instincts that make them cautious, as they are both predators and prey. So, every individual feline has their own unique personality and will have a wide variety of preferences, making it hard to generalise behaviour." But the reason cat therapy hasn't taken off is because the field is too new. "There's no standardised protocol for training," explains Mariwala. "There aren't as many studies conducted on cats - especially cats in free-roaming cultures such as India."...