The government today said dog bite cases reported at a anti-rabies clinic of the SMHS Hospital, Srinagar, had come down by 35 per cent last year even as the Srinagar Municipal Corporation (SMC) has already claimed of decrease of stray dog population by 50 per cent.
In a written reply presented during the question hour of the Legislative Council here today, the government said 5,704 dog bite cases had been recorded in 2013 whereas only 3,701 such cases were recorded in 2014.
The reply to the question asked by Congress MLC Mohammad Muzaffar Parray was presented by the Housing and Urban Development Department. While the stray dog menace continues to remain a topic for heated debates, the SMC in March 2013 had claimed that the canine population in the city had come down to 48,949.
In 2012, the government had stated in the Legislative Assembly that Srinagar had 91,110 stray dogs. The rise in the canine population and frequent dog bites had become a topic of heated debates and even triggered protests from various quarters. Even as the government did not reveal any figures, it maintained that the dog population in the city had decreased by 50 per cent.
It said the SMC had been working on multiple strategies to control the dog menace, including minimising availability of garbage on roads and animal birth control and anti-rabies programme.