From Conflict to Compassion: India’s Path to Humane Street Dog Management 

India’s street dog crisis stems not from an absence of law but from a systemic failure to implement the existing, scientifically sound Animal Birth Control Rules, which mandate capture-sterilize-vaccinate-release (CSVR). While judicial interventions, like the Supreme Court’s initial 2025 order for mass confinement, have proven reactive and logistically impossible, the corrected verdict reaffirmed the ABC program as the national standard. Evidence from successful Indian cities like Dehradun and Jaipur, alongside global models like the Netherlands, proves that high-coverage sterilization and vaccination sustainably reduce populations and rabies risk, whereas removal creates ecological vacuums.

The path forward requires transitioning from NGO-dependent projects to a fully resourced public health mission, integrating robust waste management, enforcing accountability, and launching public education to foster community-driven coexistence between humans and animals.

From Conflict to Compassion: India’s Path to Humane Street Dog Management 

Across India’s urban landscape, an estimated street dog population of tens of millions has become one of the nation’s most complex and emotionally charged civic challenges. This issue, sitting at the intersection of public safety, animal welfare, and urban ecology, often pits fear against compassion. In 2025, the Supreme Court of India attempted a dramatic intervention, ordering the mass relocation of over a million dogs in the Delhi-NCR region to shelters. This decision, met with fierce opposition, highlighted a critical truth: India does not lack a scientifically sound policy, but faces a profound crisis in implementing its own laws with consistency and compassion. The solution, as evidenced by global leaders like the Netherlands, lies not in reactionary confinement but in the disciplined, humane, and community-driven application of Capture-Sterilise-Vaccinate-Release (CSVR) programs. 

The Dutch Blueprint: A Triumph of Policy Over Impulse 

The Netherlands stands as a global beacon, having achieved the unprecedented status of a country with zero stray dogs, accomplished without resorting to culling. This was not a feat of magic but of a meticulous, government-led national strategy. The Dutch model, known as Collect, Neuter, Vaccinate, and Return (CNVR), mirrors India’s own prescribed Animal Birth Control (ABC) Rules. Their success was built on a multi-pronged approach that treated the symptom (street dogs) and the cause (human behavior). 

Key to this was legislating responsibility: high taxes on purchased dogs incentivized adoption from shelters, while strict penalties, including fines upwards of $18,000 and prison sentences for animal cruelty, created a powerful deterrent against abandonment. The government didn’t stop at law-making; it established a specialized animal police force and funded nationwide sterilization and vaccination services. This holistic framework transformed societal attitudes, leading to a reality where over 90% of Dutch dogs are cherished family members, not street dwellers. It proved that eliminating stray populations is possible when a society views it as an ethical imperative and a public health priority, backed by political will and resources. 

India’s Judicial Pendulum: From Reaction to Reason 

India’s recent legal journey with street dogs underscores the tension between panic-driven measures and evidence-based policy. The crisis came to a head in August 2025 following a tragic rabies death reported in the media. In response, a Supreme Court bench took suo moto cognizance and issued a sweeping order: all stray dogs in Delhi-NCR were to be forcibly picked up and permanently confined in newly built shelters, with an explicit ban on their release. 

The reaction was swift and fierce. Animal welfare organizations, legal experts, and public health professionals decried the order as “illogical, impractical, inhuman, and illegal”. They argued it directly contravened India’s own ABC Rules of 2023, which mandate the return of sterilized and vaccinated dogs to their territories. Critics highlighted the logistical impossibility of the task—Delhi’s existing shelters could house fewer than 5,000 dogs, against a population of up to a million. Furthermore, they warned of the “vacuum effect”: removing stable, vaccinated dog groups would simply allow new, unsterilized and potentially unvaccinated dogs to move in, exacerbating rabies risks and population growth. 

Facing significant protests, the Chief Justice of India took the rare step of reassigning the case. A larger bench reviewed the order and, in a landmark correction, overturned the mass confinement directive. It declared the original order “too harsh” and “impossible to comply with,” and instead reaffirmed the primacy of the ABC Rules, directing authorities to sterilize, vaccinate, and return dogs to their original locations. The table below captures this critical judicial shift: 

This judicial course correction was a victory for science and compassion, but it also laid bare a deeper problem: even the Supreme Court’s stern directive for nationwide compliance with ABC Rules saw abysmal follow-through, with only 2 out of 28 states submitting required reports by the deadline. 

The Implementation Abyss: Why Good Laws Fail on the Ground 

The gap between India’s progressive animal welfare laws and the chaotic reality on its streets is a chasm fueled by systemic failures. The World Organisation for Animal Health (WOAH) emphasizes that effective dog population control requires coordination across veterinary services, public health agencies, local governments, and communities. In India, this coordination is often absent. 

• Chronic Under-Resourcing: ABC programs are overwhelmingly dependent on underfunded NGOs. Government reimbursements, where they exist, often cover only a fraction of surgical costs, leaving NGOs to fundraise for ambulances, staff salaries, and infrastructure. As one activist in Guwahati noted, without proper facilities, “the ABC programme… is nearly impossible”. 

• Accountability Vacuum: Key oversight bodies like the Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals (SPCA) are frequently described as “defunct” and existing “only on paper,” leading to a lack of monitoring and enforcement. 

• The Human Factor—Cruelty and Neglect: On the ground, cruelty exacerbates fear. Dogs are often subjected to kicking, stoning, and vehicular violence, which can trigger defensive aggression. Simultaneously, a lack of public education means many people, especially children, do not know how to interact safely with dogs, and bite victims may not know proper post-exposure protocols. 

Proof of Concept: Indian Cities Leading by Example 

Despite the challenges, several Indian cities demonstrate that the ABC model, when implemented with commitment, yields transformative results. These are not theoretical successes but documented evidence of what is possible. 

• Dehradun, Uttarakhand: A partnership-driven program achieved over 90% sterilization coverage in three cities, resulting in a 40% decline in Dehradun’s street dog population and a measurable reduction in public complaints. 

• Lucknow, Uttar Pradesh: Reaching 83.4% of the city’s street dogs with sterilization and vaccination led to a dramatic reduction in dog density and improved public safety. 

• Jaipur, Rajasthan: A decade-long ABC program reportedly halved the roaming dog population, with the proportion of puppies dropping from 19% to just 2%. 

• Goa: The state has achieved approximately 70% vaccination coverage in its dog population, a critical step in controlling rabies, aided by an app-based system for tracking vaccinations. 

These cases underscore a universal formula: high-coverage, sustained sterilization combined with mass vaccination stabilizes and reduces populations, curbs rabies, and lowers human-dog conflict. 

A Roadmap for India: Beyond the Courtroom to the Community 

For India to navigate a path out of this crisis, it must move from ad-hoc judicial interventions to a structured, nationally supported, and locally executed mission. The following integrated strategy provides a actionable framework: 

• Shift from NGO-Dependence to a Public Health Mission: The government must treat ABC and rabies eradication as a public health priority on par with other disease control programs. This requires dedicated annual budgeting at national, state, and municipal levels to fund infrastructure, veterinary teams, and vaccines. 

• Build Implementation Capacity: Establish and empower dedicated ABC cells within municipal corporations, staffed with trained veterinary professionals and equipped with mobile clinics. This model, suggested by activists in Guwahati, would bring services to communities. 

• Enforce Accountability and Transparency: Revitalize monitoring bodies like SPCAs and mandate publicly accessible dashboards tracking sterilization/vaccination numbers, bite incidents, and fund utilization. The Supreme Court’s role should be to ensure this accountability, not micromanage operations. 

• Launch a National Education Campaign: A “One Health” public awareness campaign is crucial. It should teach safe human-dog interaction in schools, promote responsible pet ownership (including anti-abandonment laws), and widely disseminate rabies post-bite protocols. 

• Integrate with Civic Systems: ABC cannot succeed in isolation. Robust waste management is essential to remove food sources that artificially inflate dog carrying capacity. Similarly, urban planning should incorporate designated community dog feeding zones to minimize conflict. 

The story of India’s street dogs is, ultimately, a reflection of its societal priorities. The Netherlands proved that a nation can choose compassion without compromising safety. India possesses the legal framework, the scientific knowledge, and pockets of proven success. What it needs now is the collective will to execute its own wisdom with the same determination that the Dutch exemplified. The goal is not streets devoid of dogs, but communities where dogs, sterilized, vaccinated, and accepted, live in stable numbers without posing a threat—a state of peaceful coexistence where reason and compassion finally triumph over fear and failure.