SC expresses concern over stray dog menace

The Supreme Court Monday expressed concern over people being bitten by stray dogs and asked the authorities as to what was being done to check the menace.

A bench of Justices S A Bobde and Deepak Gupta asked the Centre's counsel about the steps being taken to address the issues.

"What are you doing about the stray dogs. Now a days people are being bitten," the bench observed.

The bench's remarks came during the hearing on a plea seeking to stop indiscriminate culling of wild boars in Tamil Nadu in violation of guidelines framed by the state government.

Petitioner Anupam Tripathi said a separate petition concerning the menace of dog bites was pending in the court and was listed for final hearing.

Tripathi told the bench that he was satisfied with the steps taken by the state government and no wild boar was culled in the past one year.

He said that through RTI applications he came to know that necessary steps were being taken by the state government to check culling of wild boars.

In wake of the steps being taken, Tripathi said, his petition has become infructuous and urged no orders be passed.

The bench then dismissed the petition as withdrawn.

On November 13, 2017, the apex court had sought reply from the Centre, the Tamil Nadu government and forest officials of the state on the plea.

It had issued notices to the Centre, Tamil Nadu Chief Minister E K Palaniswami, the state Chief Wildlife Warden and other forest officials on the plea, that also sought direction to conduct scientific survey before issuing culling orders.

In his plea, Tripathi alleged that during an all-party meeting, chaired by the chief minister on June 22, 2017, it was decided to cull and destroy wild boars in 11 district forest divisions.

The plea further claimed that due to the notification, ordinary citizens were killing wild boars by grossly neglecting guidelines issued along with the notification.

"Pass necessary orders prohibiting local villagers and communities from killing wild boars. Guidelines should be issued that any sighting of wild boars in the 11 forest divisions should be reported to forest officers," the plea said.

It said, "If such uncontrolled killing of Wild Boars is continued, that would result in loss of bio mass for various carnivorous animals and they would eventually end up entering human habitats for food and other resources."