By Zainab Fatima Ali
On the 7th of November, the Supreme Court of India released an order demanding the immediate removal of all stray dogs from premises of schools, colleges, hospitals, sports complexes, bus-stands/depots and railway stations. These dogs are to be sterilised, vaccinated and relocated to shelters with a strict ban on releasing them back at the same location. In parallel, the order calls for all stray animals (including cattle) on national highways, state-highways and expressways to be removed and relocated. But as a nation we must ask: Are we really addressing the right problem? Let’s start with numbers. India is home to an estimated 60 million stray dogs, according to recent 2025 reports. Even if we go by the most conservative official count – about 15 million, that’s still an enormous number of living beings the government now expects to remove, sterilise, vaccinate and relocate – all within weeks. Now, if each “shelter” can hold 500 dogs, India will need at least 30,000 to 120,000 shelters across the country. Where are these shelters? They don’t exist. The government hasn’t even begun constructing them. In Delhi alone, for instance, there are roughly half a million stray dogs, but official shelter capacity is barely a few hundred. Ahmedabad has over two lakh stray dogs and space for just 500. Yet, the order pretends as if infrastructure will appear overnight. This is not governance. This is wishful thinking.
Let’s be honest. When the Court says, “relocate to designated shelters”, we all know what those shelters will become. Facilities crammed beyond capacity. Animals starving, neglected, dying. No medical staff, no funding, no oversight. A shelter that cannot shelter becomes a slaughterhouse in disguise. History already tells us this: when civic bodies are overburdened, they take shortcuts. Poisoning, culling, euthanasia without oversight. Calling these places shelters is a kind lie. A gentle word hiding a cruel reality. So yes, they may call them shelters, but in practice, these places will be warehouses of suffering. Which brings me to ask: Why this? Why now? If I’m walking home late at night, I’d much rather cross paths with a dog than with a man. Because the truth is, this nation hasn’t done enough to protect its women, its children, it’s people – from assault, from rape and from domestic violence. The state that fails to control human predators now claims it will protect us from dogs? Kind souls which, if treated right, ask for nothing more than a little bit of affection and some food? Let’s face it. Stray dogs are not our biggest problem. We have bigger monsters walking these streets on two legs, not four. The order declares that schools, hospitals, bus stands and railway stations must be fenced and secured from stray dogs within eight weeks. That sounds nice on paper – but let’s think practically. When many of these institutions cannot even maintain toilets or drinking water facilities, where will they find the money to build walls and gates for dogs? And what happens to the communities that have coexisted with these animals for years – feeding them, sterilizing them, caring for them? These people are suddenly criminals now, for showing compassion? Safety cannot come from erasing life. It must come from managing it responsibly.
India already has laws under the Animal Birth Control (ABC) Rules that allow sterilisation and vaccination on site – the most humane and effective way to control stray-dog populations. But instead of strengthening that program, this order bulldozes over it, calling for mass relocation. Every animal welfare expert, every veterinarian will tell you – removing dogs from an area simply opens space for new, unvaccinated, unsterilised dogs to move in. It’s a revolving door. Not a solution. Let’s not forget: this is not a debate about dogs alone – it’s a mirror held up to our society. How we treat the most voiceless, the most vulnerable, defines us. If we can look away while thousands of dogs are rounded up and killed in the name of “order,” what’s next? Whose life will we decide is inconvenient tomorrow? We talk about making our streets safer. But what’s truly unsafe is a country that diverts attention from real issues. Unemployment, poverty, violence, inequality. What’s truly unsafe is a country that pretends that stray dogs are the enemy. That’s not leadership. That’s unapologetic deflection.
The stray dogs did not create this filth, this garbage, and this broken system. We did. These voiceless beings are only surviving in a world we dreamed of. A world we built. A world we have also drowned. The answer is not removal and relocation The answer is to manage, to vaccinate, and coexist with compassion. So yes, when I walk home at night, I’d rather meet a dog than a man – because at least the dog doesn’t lie, doesn’t rape, doesn’t murder. Until we fix that, until we make our homes and streets safe from humans, stray dogs remain the least of this nation’s problems. This order is not justice. Its cruelty disguised as control. Its bureaucracy pretending to be compassionate. And it’s a tragedy waiting to happen. The court is deeply flawed in its assumption, execution plan and logic. It forces a course of action that is neither feasible at scale nor aligned with humane, evidence-based dog population management. More crucially, it ignores the fact that the most dangerous “stray” in our social fabric remains the human predator who commits violence, assault and abuse – and the state has barely scratched that crisis. If a nation wants to become safer, it must fix the human problem first. Chasing the dog is easy; chasing the criminal is hard.
If India truly wishes to make its streets safer, it must begin by confronting the violence within its people, not the presence of its dogs. The real menace doesn’t sleep under streetlights or bark at passing cars. The real menace walks in daylight, wears respectability, and calls itself civilised. Until we have the courage to face that, all this talk of safety is hypocrisy. So yes – remove the threat if you must. But let’s be honest about what the threat really is. It’s not the stray on the street. It’s the savagery in our silence.
(Zainab is an alumna of The OASIS (Oberai School of Integrated Studies), Dehradun. During her high school years, she volunteered with a few animal shelters across the city, where she developed an understanding of animal welfare. She continues to volunteer with local shelters in a personal capacity. She does not identify with or belong to any organization.)
