India · Hyderabad first
Safe for people.
Fair to animals.
India's street-dog problem is being decided in courtrooms and municipal offices right now. bothsafe tracks it in plain words: what was ordered, what the official numbers say, where they disagree, and what you can do today. Every figure links to its source.
Right office, right now
Every problem goes to the office the law makes responsible for it, by name and designation. No guessing, no forwarding chains.
Closed isn't fixed
A complaint marked "resolved" is not the same as a street made safe. We track what offices actually did, against their own legal duties.
Nothing stored, nothing sold
No accounts, no cookies, no tracking. Whatever you report stays on your phone and goes only where you send it.
Both sides can trust it
Safe for people and fair to animals. We take no side in the fight, only the facts, each one linked to its source.
If someone is bitten or scratched
Act in the first few minutes
- Wash at once. Hold every bite or scratch under running water and wash with soap for up to 15 minutes.
- Put nothing else on it. No chilli, oil, turmeric, lime, salt or soil. An antiseptic such as povidone-iodine after washing is fine.
- Get anti-rabies vaccine the same day. Go to the nearest government hospital. Rabies is almost always fatal once symptoms start, and almost always preventable with prompt treatment.
- Emergency: call 108 (ambulance) or 112.
Source: Ministry of Health, Rabies post-exposure prophylaxis: wound management guidelines; WHO, rabies recommendations (2018). This is not medical advice; follow the doctor who treats you.
What the courts ordered
Every duty below belongs to a named office, and that is who we will hold to it. The Supreme Court's own case on street dogs: Suo Motu Writ Petition (Civil) No. 5 of 2025. Each step links to the court's order.
Next date
17 November 2026
Supreme Court review of how each state is complying (as reported; we will confirm it from the court's own list).
- Delhi-NCR: dogs to shelters. A two-judge bench ordered street dogs in Delhi-NCR moved to shelters, with no release, and a bite helpline within a week. Order
- Changed: sterilise, vaccinate, return. A three-judge bench replaced that order: sterilise, deworm, vaccinate and release dogs to the same area, except rabid or aggressive ones; feeding only at designated ward feeding spots. The case was extended to every state. Order
- Schools, hospitals, stations. Dogs to be removed from schools, hospitals, sports complexes, bus stands and railway stations and not returned there; fencing, a nodal officer per institution, and anti-rabies vaccine and immunoglobulin stocked in all hospitals. Order
- Challenges dismissed; High Courts to monitor. Pleas against the November order were dismissed; at least one sterilisation (ABC) centre per district; vaccine supply; every High Court to watch its own state's compliance. Judgment · AWBI circular
The rules behind all of this are the Animal Birth Control Rules 2023 under the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals Act 1960. Telangana's own High Court case number for this monitoring has not been made public yet; we are asking for it.
The numbers, and where they disagree
Official sources often give different figures for the same thing. We show them side by side instead of picking one. A gap between two numbers is a question, not proof of wrongdoing.
| What | Figure | Source |
|---|---|---|
| Dog bites, India, 2024 | 37,15,713 37,17,336 | Lok Sabha reply 4870 PIB, 22 Jul 2025 |
| Dog bites, India, 2023 | 30,43,339 30,52,521 | Lok Sabha reply 1290 Lok Sabha reply 4870 |
| Rabies deaths reported by states, India, 2022 · 2023 · 2024 | 21 · 50 · 54 | Lok Sabha reply 4870 (surveillance reports) |
| Rabies deaths, India, estimated from a national survey | about 5,726 a year range 3,967–7,350 | ICMR-NIE study, Lancet Infectious Diseases 2025 |
| People who died after a dog bite, India, 2023 (cause not stated) | 286 | Lok Sabha reply 1290 |
| Street dogs, India (2019 count) | 1.53 crore | PIB, 5 Apr 2022 (20th Livestock Census) |
| Dog bites, Telangana, 2022 · 2023 · 2024 | 92,924 · 1,19,014 · 1,21,997 | Lok Sabha reply 4870 |
| Rabies deaths reported, Telangana, 2022–Jan 2025 | 0 each year | Lok Sabha reply 4870. This is what the surveillance system recorded; hospital and court figures quoted in the press differ. |
Why the rabies numbers differ by 100 times
The small numbers are deaths that states reported into a surveillance system. The large one is an estimate from a door-to-door survey and a model. Many rabies deaths happen at home or are never tested, so they are never reported. Both are real measurements of different things.
Hyderabad: the numbers that are missing
How many street dogs Hyderabad has, how many are sterilised and how many bites its hospitals treat appear in public only as figures quoted to newspapers, and they conflict. The law requires the city to keep daily sterilisation records and send yearly reports, but none are published. We will ask for them under the Right to Information Act and publish the replies word for word.
Coming next: report it right, know if it's fixed
Report it right
One tap to send a bite, an injured animal, a carcass on the road or a dog-caused accident to the right office, from your own phone, with location and photo. We store nothing.
Know if it's fixed
Track your own complaint on your phone, with a ready follow-up letter if nothing happens, and see how quickly each office responds.
Help near you
Government vet hospitals, recognised animal-welfare groups and bite clinics near you, across India.
Cats and other animals
The same tools for every street animal, with rescuers and groups able to list themselves.