The Bombay High Court has a clear message for the Maharashtra government: stop chasing the symptoms of the stray dog crisis and start attacking its root cause. On August 14, a division bench directed the state to aggressively implement its Animal Birth Control (ABC) programme, calling sustained sterilisation the real key to bringing the population under control.
The bench, comprising Acting Chief Justice Ravindra V. Ghuge and Justice Gautam A. Ankhad, made the observation while hearing a suo motu petition that the Court had initiated in response to the Supreme Court’s May 2025 judgment on nationwide stray dog management.
“If You Stop the Growth, the Rest Falls in Line”
The judges didn’t mince words about where the priority should lie. Acting Chief Justice Ghuge told the state’s counsel that once the ABC Rules of 2023 are enforced properly and aggressively, the population simply stops growing on its own, making every other challenge that follows, from rabies control to public safety, far easier to manage.
“Your administration must realise one thing, that if you implement that ABC program aggressively, there will be no growth of dogs. Once that is vigorously implemented, there is no further growth of dogs and then you can tackle the remaining ones,” the bench observed.
The Court also flagged a shift in strategy it wants to see on the ground. Rather than chasing an ever-expanding number of stray dogs across a locality, authorities should be focusing squarely on catching and sterilising the adult dogs already there. With each unsterilised female capable of producing four to five puppies in a litter, the bench noted, the population math only gets harder the longer sterilisation lags behind.
“If there is no birth of puppies later, then you are nipping the disease in the bud. If you stop the growth, the rest falls in line,” the Court said.
A Working Example From the Court’s Own Campus
Interestingly, the bench didn’t just issue a directive, it pointed to evidence. The judges cited a successful sterilisation drive at the High Court’s own 57-acre Aurangabad campus as a real-world example of how controlling reproduction upfront makes everything downstream, including rabies prevention and regulated feeding, significantly more manageable for administrators.
It’s a small but telling detail: the Court isn’t asking the state to attempt something untested. It’s pointing to results already achieved within its own premises.
Where the Case Goes From Here
During the hearing, Additional Government Pleader O.A. Chandurkar informed the Court that Maharashtra’s compliance roadmap already includes implementation of the ABC programme, with several affidavits submitted detailing the state’s ongoing efforts.
The bench, however, made clear that submitting a roadmap isn’t the same as execution at scale. It has asked for further updates on the government’s actual progress, with the matter now scheduled for its next hearing on September 11.
Why This Case Matters Beyond Maharashtra
This isn’t happening in isolation. The Bombay High Court’s suo motu petition traces directly back to the Supreme Court’s broader push to establish a pan-India approach to stray dog management, following its landmark August 2025 ruling that replaced blanket relocation with a sterilise-vaccinate-release model for non-aggressive dogs.
For India’s community dog population, and the animal welfare volunteers who care for them daily, this case represents something significant: judicial pressure that treats sterilisation not as one option among many, but as the actual solution. As states across the country continue to report back to their respective High Courts on ABC compliance, Maharashtra’s next update in September could offer an early signal of whether “aggressive implementation” translates into real numbers on the ground.
Pets News Network is India’s first dedicated media platform for the pet and animal industry. For breaking global pet news, brand coverage, and advertising enquiries, contact: ankur@petsnewsnetwork.com
