Sixteen-year-old Vania* walks her Shizu Goofy in a neighbourhood park every morning in Noida Sector 17. Usually, the eight-pound dog plays with others who come with their owners, including a 50-kilo German Shepard, Mogambo. But, last week, out of nowhere, Mogambo lunged after Vania and Goofy and even as the 16-year-old rushed to pick up her tiny pup, Mogambo got a chunk out of Vania, resulting in three stitches and rabies shots for both owner and dog.
These is not an isolated incident. In the last several years, there has been a surge in dog bite incidents in India. In 2024, there were 2.2 million dog bite cases reported, and 37 of those were fatal. In 500,000 of those cases, the victims were under the age of 15.
The 2024 numbers are still a marked improvement from the year before. In In 2023, India recorded 3.05 million canine attacks, and 286 fatalities from dog bites.
Urban Areas Hot Spots Due to Stray Dog Population
Amid growing concern of these dog bite cases, some urban districts have emerged as hot spots. In 2024, Noida, for example, saw a 31 per cent increase in dog bite cases. A large majority of these incidents have been blamed on stray dog and their increasing population in cities. However, in some cities like Madurai, despite a decrease in stray dog numbers, have seen the highest number of dog bites since 2018.
There have been alarming reported cases for dog bites involving children this year바카라” over 5 lakh victims in 2024 were children under 15 years of age. In Badlapur, Maharashtra, a nine-year-old girl died of rabies after a stray dog bite. In Mandya, Karnataka, a four-year-old girl died in a traffic accident while being rushed to the hospital following a dog bite.
Judicial Intervention
The law is fighting back too: in Bhopal, when a 65-year-old man was bitten by a neighbour바카라™s pet dog, the courts allowed legal action against the owner. The judiciary has begun to take an active interest in addressing the canine crisis. In May 2025, the Delhi High Court directed authorities to formulate a policy for the removal, rehabilitation, and sheltering of stray dogs. The bench said there was an urgent need to balance public safety with animal welfare.
Rabies: An Ever-Present Threat
Over 36 per cent of the deaths attributed to Rabies occur in India, making it one of the global hot spots for the deadly disease carried by dogs and other animals. The increase in the number of dog bites could be attributed to more people getting dogs but not taking time to train them, veteran canine trainer Nitin Netrapal.
"What has happened since the 2020 COVID19 pandemic is that people are buying more dogs from breeders and even adopting dogs from NGOs, but they have very little knowledge on how to keep them or train them," Netrapal explains. He has been training large and small dogs for 바카라œcanine aggression" for over a decade.
An increasing number of dog bite cases is also a strain on hospitals. Delhi clinics, for example, witness overcrowded animal bite clinics, with some treating more than 500 patients every day, says Netrapal.
Regional Hot Spots
Several regions have emerged as hotspots for dog bite incidents:
Jalandhar, Punjab: Witnessed a 27 per cent increase in dog bite cases, a total of 23,004 in 2024.
Mohali, Punjab: Over 6,400 cases in 2024, largely involving children.
Mysuru, Karnataka: An average of 19 dog bite incidents daily, and doubled in 2024 to 7,225.
Bhopal, Madhya Pradesh: counted 85 cases a day in 2024.
Noida, Uttar Pradesh: A 31% increase in dog bite cases, totalling 1.3 lakh cases in 2024, of which 85 per cent were blamed on stray dogs.
Government Initiatives
The National Rabies Control Programme aims to prevent and control rabies through surveillance, awareness campaigns, and vaccination drives. The Animal Birth Control (Dogs) Rules, 2001, make it mandatory to sterilise and vaccinate stray dogs.
