The Supreme Court of India has issued stringent orders for making educational institutions and public spaces free from the menace of stray dogs.
Hearing a suo motu case on Friday, November 7, regarding the alarming rise of dog bite cases all over the nation, the apex court bench, comprising of Justices Vikram Nath, Sandeep Mehta, and NV Anjaria mandated that critical public spaces like educational institutions, railway stations, bus depots, hospitals, public sports complexes etc should be fenced properly to make them stray dog free.
They ordered local governing bodies and municipal corporations must ensure that the stray dogs captured from these sites must undergo vaccinations and sterilisation before being taken to designated shelters.
The SC order also stated that there should be a strict prohibition on re-releasing the dogs back in the same area.
Highlighting the alarming increase in rabies cases and stray dog attacks on children and the elderly, the SC stated that Chief Secretaries of states will be held personally accountable for the delays in ABC rule compliance and a status report must be submitted.
The bench also upheld the Rajasthan High Court directives for clearing stray cattle from highways and expressways, ordering immidiate measures to shift the stray cattle to goshalas.
Animal activists and their advocates, like Karuna Nundy and Anand Grover tried to stall the order, claiming that the removal of strays will merely ‘displace’ the problem. But the SC prioritised urgent action.
In July this year, a bench of justices JB Pardiwala and R Mahadevan had taken suo motu cognisance of media reports that highlighted the severity of the stray dog problem in Delhi, and how children are paying the price of government negligence.
