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The Supreme Court’s recent order on removing stray dogs from Delhi and confining them to shelters has set off a wave of outrage among animal lovers and activists. The move, they say, is impractical, inhumane and a direct violation of the Animal Birth Control (ABC) rules that mandate sterilisation and vaccination instead of mass removal.
On the ground, in Gurgaon’s gated societies, community dog caretakers like Rumela Basu have already seen Resident Welfare Associations (RWA) and municipal bodies pass the buck when it comes to taking care of strays. “Municipal bodies do nothing for vaccination or sterilisation. Caregivers spend their own time and money to make sure dogs are safe. RWAs and the municipal corporation keep passing the buck,” Basu said.
She described how designated feeding points were set up away from children’s areas, following all rules, only for bowls to be thrown away on RWA orders. Once the feeding stopped, dogs began scavenging again. “There are lakhs of dogs and hardly any shelters, all of which are full. If you really want to house them humanely, you’d need thousands of shelters ready in eight weeks. Who’s paying for them? Where is the land?” she asked.
Basu pointed out the irony of residents who feed dogs during religious occasions like Navratri for “punya” but want them gone otherwise. “You will see kheer and khichdi left in the middle of the road during festivals, but the rest of the year, the same people want to remove them,” she said.
‘A slap to Hindu dharma’
For Titas Mukherjee, an animal rights activist from Kolkata, the court’s stand is both a betrayal and a contradiction. “It’s a big slap to Hindu religion where dogs are sacred and worshipped at places like Varanasi. The prime minister praises feeders, but his party is covering up years of failure to sterilise and vaccinate by sending lakhs of dogs to shelters that don’t exist,” she said.
Mukherjee added that in a country where government hospitals and asylums are poorly managed despite public protests, there is little reason to believe dog shelters will fare better. “Science and logic are being defied. This move will have a huge ecological impact if not reversed,” she warned.
‘As impractical as telling women to stay indoors’
Sneha Dutta, an animal lover and communications professional, criticised the court for not holding the Delhi government accountable for its failure to sterilise strays. “Delhi has bigger issues like women’s safety, road accidents and pollution — all of which kill far more people than dog bites. This verdict is as impractical as telling women to stay indoors because the state can’t protect them,” she said.
‘This will only increase man-animal conflict’
Pet parent Shamayita Chakraborty believes the decision will worsen the situation on the streets. “Stray dog bites and rabies are, of course, real issues, but the solution is vaccination and sterilisation, not removing them from their territories,” she said.
According to Chakraborty, dogs are friendly animals by nature and used to living alongside humans. Displacing them into crowded facilities is “like putting them in detention camps”. “If municipalities want, they can vaccinate dogs quickly and effectively. Taking them away makes no sense and will only increase conflict,” she said.
‘They are the voiceless, and also part of our society’
More than 500 stray dogs in Kolkata have been under the care of school teacher and animal activist Manisha Chowdhury’s team for the past 10 to 15 years. Through her organisation, Miracle for Voiceless, she and her volunteers have been feeding, treating, sterilising and vaccinating them to ensure peaceful coexistence between animals and humans.
“The decision on Delhi dogs isn’t acceptable to us. Removing all stray dogs from the streets and confining them to pounds is not a good decision. These dogs play a great part in protecting people at night from thieves. The government should come up with a proper plan to neuter and vaccinate them regularly, and most importantly, to feed them,” Chowdhury said, adding, “Removing them from the street is never a solution. Please think twice. They are voiceless, and they are also part of our society,” she said.
