Delhi Has Zero State-Run Shelters. How Will It House 10 Lakh Stray Dogs?

NDTV

3 days ago

The Supreme Court's directive on Monday that all stray dogs in Delhi and the National Capital Region should be removed from the streets and permanently housed in shelters has raised an outcry amongst dog lovers and animal rights activists who say that the order is unjust, unscientific, unimplementable and inhuman.
This is, of course, a deeply polarising ruling. While many have welcomed the apex court's decision, pointing to the growing incidence of dog bites and attacks on children by street dogs, animal lovers feel that picking up strays and housing them in shelters, which do not even exist as yet, is tantamount to passing a death sentence on them. From Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) leader Maneka Gandhi to neighbourhood animal rights activists who feed and care for strays, everyone is of the view that the court has acted thoughtlessly and without due regard to their concerns for the welfare of these voiceless animals.
The fact that this ruling overturns the existing Animal Birth Control Rules, which state that strays should be sterilised and released back on the streets, has also incensed animal lovers. They insist that street dogs are community animals and should be allowed to remain in the neighbourhoods to which they are accustomed, and that effective sterilisation is the best way to reduce the population of street dogs over time.
Let us look at what the bench comprising Justice JB Pardiwala and Justice R Mahadevan, which issued the directive in the suo motu case taken up by it, actually said. First, it asked governments and civic authorities in Delhi and the National Capital Region (NCR) to immediately start setting up dog shelters and report on the progress of this exercise within eight weeks. Second, it said that the authorities should begin by providing shelters for 5,000 dogs within the next six to eight weeks and progressively ramp up this effort. Third, civic bodies should immediately start rounding up stray dogs from every locality. "This should be the first and foremost exercise to make all localities within the city and outskirts free of stray dogs," the bench said. Fourth, it has warned that anyone who tries to prevent stray dogs from being picked up will face penal action.
To be sure, the apex court's directive seems to be oblivious of several realities on the ground. At present, the Municipal Corporation of Delhi (MCD) does not have a single dog pound, and the only shelters that exist are run by NGOs. At last count, Delhi had an estimated 10 lakh stray dogs. With successive governments failing to carry out a robust sterilisation programme and leaving the job primarily to resource-strapped animal welfare organisations, that number could have gone up significantly. The judges have not given a deadline for housing all stray dogs in shelters, choosing to give six to eight weeks for setting up shelters for 5,000 dogs to begin with. But no matter what that deadline may eventually be, the civic authorities in Delhi and NCR will have to find the funds (likely to be hundreds of crores per month), the land, and the manpower needed to build the infrastructure, run the shelters efficiently, and ensure that they provide a safe and hygienic environment for the strays.
This is a mammoth, and some say, unachievable task. And given the government's abysmal record in conducting the much simpler job of sterilising stray dogs, animal rights activists are right to be apprehensive that the implementation of the Supreme Court directive may well degenerate into a brutal drive to round up strays, carry them off to unnamed places, and consign them to a potentially fatal end.
This must not be allowed to happen. And the Supreme Court must ensure that it does not. However, the question to ask here is not whether the task of getting strays off the streets is unimplementable for a variety of reasons. The question to ask is, is it fundamentally the right thing to do, and is it a goal worth working towards in order to put an end to stray dogs coming into conflict with humans in Delhi and elsewhere?
Many animal lovers believe that making India's public spaces free of stray dogs is inherently, almost morally, wrong. They believe that strays should be allowed to roam free after sterilisation - even though this is not the case in any developed country, where animal rights groups are no less vocal or active. The argument that the norm does not apply to India because we are not a developed nation does not wash, since, by that token, we must never take any steps to put in place systems and infrastructure that are the mark of economically advanced countries.
There is no doubt that this is a hugely emotive issue, one that involves people's deep love for the animals they care for. Hence, it is not enough for the Supreme Court to merely pass an order to make the streets of Delhi-NCR free of stray dogs. It must allay all apprehensions. Indeed, the ruling will be meaningful only if the court takes all factors into account and exercises oversight every step of the way - not just in the short term but also in the long term. If, eventually, this order is to be acceptable to all, the Supreme Court must take concrete steps to ensure that the implementation of the ruling does not become an excuse for cruelty to the animals, ensure that governments and civic bodies allocate realistic budgets for setting up the shelters within a specified time frame, and that they work with all stakeholders to conduct the exercise in a just and humane way.