Editorial: SC strikes a middle path on street dogs
While the earlier order would have been unworkable and inhumane, the Supreme Court in its revised order has placed the burden of handling the issue of street dogs squarely back on municipal governance
The Supreme Court has sought to strike a middle path on the issue of relocating stray dogs, balancing the conflicting interests of public health and animal welfare. By overturning its earlier directive mandating permanent relocation of all strays to shelters, the apex court now says that sterilised and vaccinated dogs are to be released back into their localities, except those infected with rabies or exhibiting aggressive behaviour. This raises fresh questions. What is the definition of an aggressive dog, and who gets to decide that? And, what safeguards currently exist against any misuse? The new order allows healthy, non-aggressive dogs to be sterilised, vaccinated, and returned to their capture. At the same time, it insists that rabid or aggressive animals be confined in shelters, and it bans the feeding of strays in public places, requiring municipal bodies to designate proper feeding zones. Adoption has been permitted through civic authorities, but adopted dogs must not be sent back to the streets. The judgment raises a fresh set of challenges. Enforcing feeding bans in crowded cities is easier said than done. Ensuring that designated feeding areas are created, maintained, and used responsibly will require coordination between civic authorities, resident groups, and animal welfare volunteers. Adoption, too, while a humane pathway, will call for rigorous monitoring to prevent abandonment. The court has placed the burden squarely back on municipal governance. India’s urban local bodies have long struggled and often failed to implement sterilisation and vaccination programmes at the scale required.
Experts have pointed out that funds are routinely underutilised or siphoned off, while waste management, a key driver of stray proliferation, remains woefully inadequate. Even getting a dog licence for a pet is a challenge in the national capital. Without addressing these basic issues, even the well-intended judicial orders run the risk of falling into the familiar cycle of half-measures and neglect. The promise of a national policy on strays, as hinted at by the court, deserves serious consideration by the government. Patchy state-level responses have created inconsistency and confusion, with each crisis spawning litigation instead of coordinated solutions. A central framework could finally bring uniform standards for sterilisation, vaccination, shelter design, and accountability mechanisms. India had reported nearly 37 lakh dog bites and over 50 suspected rabies deaths in 2024. These are figures that cannot be ignored. At the same time, the country lacks the infrastructure or resources to house millions of strays in shelters. The earlier order would have been unworkable and inhumane. Aggressive canines roaming freely on the streets are a nightmare for workers returning home late at night or children from poor and middle-class families playing near their homes. It is only the rich and celebrities, who live behind fortress-like gates and rarely set foot in a street where stray dogs run wild, who can afford to be unaffected by this problem.
