50k stray dogs, but city has shelters for only 100 now
In a meeting held hours after the court ruling, municipal commissioner Pradeep Dahiya asked Preetpal Singh, joint commissioner (Swachh Bharat Mission), to start working towards implementing the order. The court's directive, however, contradicts the Animal Welfare Board of India's 2022 advisory that recommended against relocating stray dogs.
The Monday verdict came in response to repeated incidents of dog bite cases across Delhi-NCR, which have raised concerns regarding public safety.
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Dahiya told TOI after the meeting, "We will first study the Supreme Court order and then decide on the further course of action. Yes, we must allocate space to set up dog shelters in the city. But we will have to determine whether these shelters will be set up zone-wise or ward-wise."
But implementing the order seems easier said than done. The Municipal Corporation of Gurgaon (MCG) now faces the daunting task of relocating an estimated 50,000 stray dogs in shelter homes.
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But as of now, the city has only two operational dog shelters — each with a capacity of 50 animals, located in Baliwas and Daultabad. Two additional shelters are under construction in Basai and Begampur Khatola, but they, too, can only accommodate 50 dogs each. This limited infrastructure presents a formidable challenge for MCG, which must now find ways to house the entire stray dog population.
But why does the city lack adequate animal shelters?
An MCG official explained, "The Animal Birth Control (ABC) Rules, 2023, required us to return sterilised dogs to their original locations.
So, we never built extensive infrastructure for housing these animals. Creating such spaces now, and ensuring they are equipped with CCTV surveillance to prevent animal cruelty, will be a significant challenge."
Apart from relocating strays, the apex court has also asked authorities to ensure that dogs that have already been picked up and moved to shelters earlier are not released back on to the streets. It has warned against any resistance to the relocation efforts, emphasising the need to make streets free of stray dogs.
For civic bodies, the challenge is to balance public safety with humane treatment of stray animals, all while grappling with infrastructure limitations.
Officials said MCG had been working with two private agencies for dog sterilisation and vaccination. According to them, over 20,000 dogs have been sterilised in the city since Jan this year.
But the contracts of these agencies are set to expire in Dec. To improve coverage, the corporation is now planning to hire four separate agencies — one for each city zone — to continue with the sterilisation programme.
"We are working to improve our numbers of dog sterilisation. After the contract of these two agencies gets over, we are planning to hire four separate agencies, one for each zone of the city. This will ensure better coverage in terms of sterilisation of the stray dog population," Preetpal said.
In June 2023, MCG had informed the Punjab and Haryana high court that there were over 17,000 stray dogs in the city, with 1,670 dog bite cases reported in the previous three years.
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an hour ago
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