Stray Dogs case| Supreme Court refuses Bihar Chief Secretary's plea to not appear in person citing upcoming polls

The Supreme Court today refused a plea made before it by the Chief Secretary of Bihar seeking an exemption from personal appearance before court in the matter pertaining to stray dogs.

Notably, the exemption was sought on grounds of the upcoming assembly polls. The assembly polls in the state of Bihar are starting from November 6.

Rejecting the request, Supreme Court said the Chief Secretary has nothing to do with elections and Election Commission is there to oversee that the polls happen smoothly.

Recently, after noting that only three compliance affidavits had been filed before it i.e., by the State of West Bengal, State of Telangana and Municipal Corporation of Delhi, the supreme court had ordered the Chief Secretaries of all the States and Union Territories other than the States of West Bengal and Telangana to remain present before it on 3.11.2025 at 10:30 A.M. along with their respective explanations as to why compliance affidavits have not been filed.

It also expressed its concern over the country's image going down because of the constant incidents of dog attacks taking place across the country. "Continuous incidents are happening and the image of the country is being shown down. We are also reading news reports," a Justice Vikram Nath led bench noted while hearing a suo motu case on stray dog menace.

In its previous order, the court had directed the impleadment of all States and Union Territories in the instant matter through the Secretaries concerned of the Animal Husbandry Department, Secretaries of the local bodies (Municipal Corporation, Municipal Councils, Municipalities, etc.) and the Administrators of the Union Territories so as to seek information from each authority regarding the steps being taken for compliance of the ABC Rules in their respective jurisdictions.

On August 22nd, court had also partly stayed its recent order directing relocation of dogs from all localities of Delhi, Ghaziabad, NOIDA, Faridabad, Gurugram as well as areas on the outskirts, to designated shelters / pounds. "Prohibition on release of strays is stayed. They shall be dewormed, vaccinated and sent back to the respective areas.", a three-judge bench had said.

Court had further noted that it cannot be ignorant of the fact that the mandate to keep all the stray dogs, picked up from Delhi and the adjoining NCR cities, in the municipal shelters/pounds would require logistics of gargantuan proportions including manpower, shelters/pounds, veterinarians, cages and specially modified vehicles for transportation of the captured stray dogs.

In July the top court had taken suo-moto cognizance of a very disturbing and alarming Newspaper cutting reported by the `Times of India’ in its Delhi edition titled “City Hounded By Strays, Kids Pay Price”. "Everyday, hundreds of dog bites are being reported in the city and the areas on the outskirts, leading to rabies and ultimately young infants, children and aged are falling prey to this dreadful disease. We are shocked to know that on an average 20,000 cases of dog bites are recorded in the country and out of which 2000 incidents happen in Delhi every day", the bench had noted.

As per the Newspaper report amidst the rising threat of stray dog in the national capital, a 6 year old girl by name Chavi Sharma fell prey to multiple dog bites leaving deep wounds on her left leg, arm and palm. Although the inhabitants of the locality complained for several times to the authorities concerned, yet none paid heed to the complaints of the people residing in the said locality. Also, a four year old boy Abhishek Rai was attacked by a pack of stray dogs on 23-7-2025 in Delhi’s Alipur area of Narela when the child was returning from his Anganwadi School. The dogs pounced at his face repeatedly injuring him until few bystanders rushed to his rescue.

Case Title: IN RE: “CITY HOUNDED BY STRAYS, KIDS PAY PRICE”