Amid row, new 3-judge Supreme Court bench to hear stray dogs case on Thursday

Amid widespread protests across India over the top court’ order to relocate stray dogs in Delhi-NCR, a new three-judge Bench of the Supreme Court will hear the suo motu case on Thursday.

On August 11, a Bench of Justice JB Pardiwala and Justice R Mahadevan had issued directions to permanently relocate all canines from streets to shelters "at the earliest".

“We are conscious and sensitive of co-existence. The idea behind co-existence is not the existence of one’s life at the cost of the other,” it said in the order released on Wednesday.

Flagging the attacks faced by the most vulnerable sections of society, it said, “We are at pains to take cognizance of the experiences of visually impaired persons, young children, elderly persons, people from humble background who are not able to afford even a day’s meal, let alone the medical expenses.”

"A virtual divide is being attempted to be created between ‘animal lovers’ and persons indifferent towards animals. But the heart of the problem remains unanswered, for all practical reasons. As a court, our heart pains equally for everyone. We condemn those who, beneath the cloak of “love and care” for the voiceless, pursue the warmth of self-congratulation. The directions given by us, as a court which functions for the welfare of the people, are both in the interest of humans as well as dogs. This is not personal,” the order released on Wednesday said.

An NGO -- All Creatures Big & Small – has filed an application seeking recall of the top court’s August 11 order, terming it impractical.

Now, a three-judge Bench of Justice Vikram Nath, Justice Sandeep Mehta and Justice NV Anjaria will hear it on August 14.

In the morning, some petitioners in another stray dogs-related case mentioned their plea and referred to the August 11 verdict before the CJI BR Gavai, who said "I will look into it".

The lawyer referred to a May 2024 order passed by a Bench led by Justice JK Maheshwari relegating petitions relating to the stray dogs issue to respective high courts.

Petitioner Conference for Human Rights (India) claimed the Animal Birth Control (Dog) Rules, 2001, mandating regular sterilisation and immunisation programmes for stray dogs to curtail their growing population were not being complied with.