A meeting of the State Animal Welfare Board decided to ask the LSG department to make licensing compulsory for all pet dogs and initiate measures to install microchips on them to ensure they are vaccinated. | Photo credit: H. VIBHU
The State Animal Welfare Board here on Friday (December 19) decided to recommend the Local Government Department (LSG) to strengthen vaccination of stray dogs and suggest amendments to the Kerala Panchayat Raj Act and the Kerala Municipalities Act to prevent pet dogs from being abandoned on the streets.
The board meeting, chaired by Animal Husbandry Minister J. Chinchurani, also decided to ask the LSG department to make licensing compulsory for all pet dogs and initiate measures to install microchips on them to ensure they are vaccinated.
The council’s decision assumes significance in the backdrop of the Supreme Court’s November 7 order to states and union territories to remove stray dogs from public spaces and relocate them to designated shelters after sterilization and vaccination.
The department will be asked to set up isolation kennels in all panchayats to house violent and diseased dogs. The LSG and Breeding departments will be asked to convene meetings of dog shelter operators in order to improve the basic infrastructure in these facilities.
The board also decided to recommend the LSG department to set up shelter management committees at the district level as per the directions of the Supreme Court.
Apart from the seven portable Animal Birth Control (ABC) units planned by the Animal Husbandry department, the LSG department will be asked to set up portable ABC units in all block panchayats that lack them. It has also been decided to establish a people’s committee in places where there is opposition to the establishment of ABC centres.
Further, the services of the Kerala Solutions for Management Administrative Reformation and Transformation (K-SMART) project will be sought to streamline the pet dog licensing process.
Published – 19 Dec 2025 21:24 IST
