SOPs issued for civic bodies on stray relocation after SC order

The Animal welfare Board of India has issued a standard operating procedure (SOP) for municipal authorities to implement the Supreme Court's November 7 order stating removal of stray dogs from public institutional premises.

- Paras Singh

The SOP includes fixing dimensions of new shelters, conditions of these premises, identifying places from where stray dogs will be picked up, among others.

The first step as per the SOP, issued by Dr. Muthukumarasamy B, chairman of AWBI, is to identify the existing shelters and areas where new shelters could be established. An area of 70x40 feet has been fixed for keeping 100 dogs; 57x90 feet for 500 dogs, and 221x127 feet for maintaining 1,000 dogs.

Animal rights activists have flagged that the space would be too small to keep the relocated dogs. “You can’t even keep 20 dogs in this space. Do they want to make shelters like shops? They have failed to implement the vaccination and sterilisations. They did not even wait for the January 13 court hearing. All animal lovers should demand the joint secretary of AWBI to resign,” Manavi Rai, an animal rights activist and rescuer in Delhi, said.