Should stray animals be killed?

Theme :-

• On January 18th, 2017, Supreme Court reacted negatively to petitioner asking for totally destroying stray dogs across India and said that “Stray dogs too have a right to live“.

In Favor :-

• A lot of dog bite incidents are being reported across India.
• Roughly 36% of the world’s rabies deaths occur in India each year, according to World Health Organization (WHO).
• If stray dogs are not killed, their population will keep on increasing causing more danger to humans, especially to children.
• Stray dogs are often carriers of diseases because of the lack of care.
• Stray dogs’ feces and barks are decreasing the qualify of life for people in cities.

Against :-

• There are alternatives to killing stray animals. Sterilization and culling instead of killing them can solve the problem.
• Animal rights activists say that dog bites are the consequence of the pathetic conditions stray animals live in and the rise of cruelty against them.
• Dog bites are turning into dangerous because of the failure of Municipal Corporations to vaccinate stray dogs.

Situation in India :-

• India has more than 3 crore stray dogs as of 2017.
• More than one lakh people have been bitten by dogs in 2015-16 in Kerala alone.
• India has a law ‘Prevention of Cruelty to Animals Act, 1960‘ against killing of stray dogs.
• India like many other countries follow spaying and neutering to control stray dog population.
• Many Indians, who are suffering from street dog menace are requesting for mass killing of stray dogs.

Situation in other countries :-

• USA has strict laws on animal welfare. Those who are cruel to dogs can face criminal charges.
• France could eradicate Rabies by strict vaccination requirement laws.
• Many countries are euthanizing unadoptable stray dogs because of the lack of space in animal shelters.

Best practices worldwide :-

• Spaying and neutering of stray animals, i.e sterilization is considered as the best method to reduce the rapid growth of stray animals.
• Though dog breeding is a big business, people are now preferring to adopt street dogs instead of encouraging dog breeders.
• Many countries have animal shelters that run on government funds.

Conclusion :-

It’s true that street dogs pose threat for many people and especially children, who have street dogs in their close vicinity. This needs to be addressed. But instead of choosing the method of killing, supporting sterilization method will greatly reduce the problem. And the mass vaccination programs of stray animals by government will further decrease the problem. However, in some cases selecting killing of stray dogs is inevitable.

Afterwords :- Do you think killing stray animals will solve the street dog menace? Express your thoughts in the comment section below.

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