CJI agrees to consider listing stray dog issue after petitioner unearths 2024 SC order to treat animals with compassion

Chief Justice of India B.R. Gavai on Wednesday (August 13, 2025) agreed to look into an urgent request to list a case regarding community dogs in the backdrop of an August 11 order of the apex court directing them to be rounded up from Delhi streets and detained in shelters within six to eight weeks, never to be let out in public spaces again.

In an urgent mentioning, a lawyer informed the Chief Justice about a May 9, 2024 order to treat stray canines with compassion.

The counsel read out from the order by a Supreme Court Bench headed by Justice J.K. Maheshwari that “under all circumstances, there cannot be any indiscriminate killings of canines and the authorities have to take action in terms of the mandate and spirit of the prevalent legislation(s) in place”.

The apex court was hearing a batch of petitions led by Animal Welfare Board of India versus People for Elimination of Stray Troubles on the question whether Central legislations, including the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals Act, 1960 and the Animal Birth Control Rules, 2001, would prevail over the municipal laws.

“There is no gainsaying in the fact that exhibiting compassion to all living beings is the enshrined Constitutional value and mandate and casts obligation on the authorities,” the Bench of Justices Maheshwari and Sanjay Karol had emphasised.

The August 11 order by a Bench of Justices J.B. Pardiwala and R. Mahadevan has triggered a furore among animal rights activists, personalities and organisations, who have argued that there were not enough pounds to house 5,000 community dogs. They have also pointed out that the pressure of capturing so many community dogs from the streets would slip into confusion and acts of cruelty against the animals.

“I will look into it,” Chief Justice Gavai orally assured.

On August 11, the Bench headed by Justice Pardiwala had warned that anyone trying to resist stray canines from being picked or rounded up would face contempt action from the Supreme Court.

The apex court said authorities should “at the earliest, start picking up strays from all localities, more particularly the vulnerable ones in the city and outskirts. How to do it is for the authorities to decide. If they have to create a force, do it at the earliest. The foremost and first exercise is to free localities from stray dogs. There is no compromise”.

The court’s order came in a suo motu case on the increasing instances of stray dog attacks on children, including infants.

Addressing the clamour to protect stray dogs, the court had asked whether animal rights activists would be able to return children lost to rabid stray canines to their parents.

The Justice Pardiwala’s Bench had said the situation with stray dogs was “extremely grim” across the national capital territory, Noida, Gurugram and Ghaziabad.

Justice Pardiwala said the court’s directions were in the best public interest and to end a menace.