Pets in Chennai, 2026: 1.81 lakh street dogs at 27 percent sterilised, a state that counts 4.79 lakh bites and 40 rabies deaths a year, sterilisation centres doubled to 11, a Rs 50 licence that 73,754 owners have taken under a Rs 5,000 fine, and a free municipal pet crematorium

Pets in Chennai: the city's numbers on one page

Chennai is the one big city whose corporation has counted its dogs, licensed its pets under a fine, and opened a crematorium in the same two years. Fifteen figures, from thirteen sources.

Two rows carry the weight. Chennai's survey found three dogs in four unsterilised, the lowest share of any city that has counted; and its state counts more dog bites per head than any other in the national table. The rest of this report is about what the corporation built, fined and opened in the two years since the count.

1.81 lakh street dogs, 27 percent sterilised: the 2024 survey, zone by zone

Chennai's count tripled the 2018 figure and found the sterilised share lowest where the dogs were most. The zones explain the city.

The Greater Chennai Corporation's dog population survey, released by Mayor R. Priya on 20 September 2024, found that 'the number of stray dogs in the city has increased to 1.81 lakh from 58,000 in 2018', and that 'only 27 percent of the dogs were sterilized'. The census was carried out from July 2024 by Worldwide Veterinary Service and 'was conducted thrice on different days to prevent repetition in data'. Ambattur zone had the most dogs, 23,980, with only 18 percent sterilised; Madhavaram 17,096 and Sholinganallur 16,195; Alandur the fewest, 4,875, and the highest sterilised share, 57 percent, with Adyar at 36 percent and the north Chennai zones of Tondiarpet and Manali at 19 and 21 percent.

The count is the city's; the state's census says less. Tamil Nadu reported 4,41,208 stray dogs to the 2019 Livestock Census, 31.9 percent fewer than the 6,47,798 of 2012 and 5.8 per 1,000 people, so Chennai's 1.81 lakh would be two-fifths of the state's total. Bonbeno's street dog report sets the Chennai survey beside Mumbai's 90,757 at 62.9 percent sterilised and Bengaluru's 2,79,335 at 72 percent, which is the comparison that matters: Chennai had the fewest sterilised dogs per hundred of any city that has counted, and the largest job ahead of it.

Dog bites and rabies: 4.79 lakh bites and 40 deaths in the state, 25,000 to 30,000 bites a year in the city, and one death that reached the news

Tamil Nadu publishes the longest bite and rabies series of any state in this series, and the city's share of it is a round number from its health officer.

Tamil Nadu reported approximately 4.79 lakh dog bite cases in 2024 against 4,41,804 in 2023, and 40 rabies deaths against 22, an 80 percent rise in deaths in a year; the years before were 8,83,213 bites and 28 deaths in 2022, 8,19,779 and 19 in 2021, 7,14,447 and 20 in 2020, and the death toll runs back through 19 in 2019, 31 in 2018 and 16 in 2017. The IDSP table laid before the Lok Sabha gives the state 4,80,427 bites in 2024, 623 per lakh of population, the highest rate in India, and 2 suspected rabies deaths where the state counts 40; Bonbeno's dog bite report ranks every state on that table. For the city, the corporation's health officer gives the average: 'While 25,000 to 30,000 dog bite cases are reported in the city yearly on average, no rabies deaths have been recorded in the city last year'.

2025: counted death by death, and 1,34,674 dogs vaccinated

The 2025 count arrived death by death. In September 2025 a 47-year-old Chennai auto driver bitten by a street dog in July died of rabies, 'the 23rd person to die of rabies in Tamil Nadu so far this year', his family saying he had completed the vaccination course and the hospital saying he had not returned for his later doses. In November 2025 The Federal reported 'a nine per cent spike in dog bites in Chennai, which recorded 5.25 lakh cases in 2025, while it was about 4.7 lakh in 2024', and 28 rabies deaths against 43, figures on the scale of the state's series rather than the city's 25,000 to 30,000; this report prints them as reported. On the other side of the needle, the corporation had vaccinated 1,34,674 dogs against rabies between 2021 and 15 September 2025, 88,439 strays and 46,235 pets.

The Animal Birth Control programme: five centres to eleven in a year, 115 surgeries a day to 200, and a 400-a-day target

After the survey the corporation built. The centre count more than doubled between September 2025 and August 2026, and the state told it to double the output again.

In September 2025 the corporation ran five Animal Birth Control centres, at Pulianthope, Lloyds Colony, Kannammapettai, Meenambakkam and Sholinganallur, sterilising 'on average, 115 stray dogs' a day, with ten more being established. By June 2026 ten were functioning, the five above plus Chettimedu in Manali zone, Tiruvottiyur, Madhavaram, Chettimedu in Tondiarpet zone and Kannappar Thidal, four more were being built at Athipattu, Nandambakkam, Velachery and the Bio-CNG plant area in Sholinganallur, and the state's Additional Chief Secretary Gagandeep Singh Bedi directed the corporation to raise surgeries 'from the current 200 per day to 350-400 per day' and reach 100 percent anti-rabies coverage of street dogs and pets. The Pulianthope centre alone did 35 surgeries and treated 25 pets a day.

On 23 August 2026 the corporation opened the Nandambakkam centre, a dog sterilisation centre and veterinary hospital built 'at a cost of Rs 7.87 crore' on 1,408 square metres from its own capital funds, taking its Animal Birth Control centres to 11, with three more under construction at Athipattu, Velachery and Sholinganallur; it 'currently conducts sterilisation surgeries on around 200 stray dogs a day' and 'aims to increase its capacity to around 350-400'. At 200 a day the programme reaches about 73,000 dogs a year, 40 percent of the 1.81 lakh counted; at 400 it would reach the survey's unsterilised 1.32 lakh in under a year. Separate shelters of 250 dogs each are being developed at Manali and Perungudi.

The Supreme Court's order, the missed deadline and the Rs 50 a dog

On 7 November 2025 the Supreme Court ordered every school, hospital, sports complex, bus stand and railway station cleared of street dogs, with the dogs moved to shelters after sterilisation and vaccination and compliance reports due in eight weeks. Chennai missed the deadline: by February 2026 it had removed 40 dogs from the Madras High Court premises, 21 of them to an NGO shelter at Nemmeli and the rest adopted, had announced in December 'Rs 50 per dog per day for feeding costs' and 'Rs 750 per day for shelters housing more than 20 dogs', and planned two dedicated shelters of up to 250 dogs each on land at Madhavaram and Velachery by the end of March, with its authorised shelters already full and a citywide survey not yet started.

The pet licence: Rs 50, a microchip, a Rs 5,000 fine, 73,754 takers, and no new licences for Pit Bulls or Rottweilers

Chennai turned a Rs 50 formality into the most enforced pet licence in the country in three months. The numbers are the corporation's.

A pet licence from the Greater Chennai Corporation (GCC) costs Rs 50, is applied for on the corporation's pet licence portal, and runs to the date of the dog's latest anti-rabies vaccination, with reminders a month, a week and a day before expiry; the owner signs up with name, contact and address and uploads an address proof, enters the pet's name, photograph, identification marks, species, breed, gender and colour, and the veterinarian enters the microchip and vaccination details against a Veterinary Council ID. The licence deadline was 23 November 2025 and a Rs 5,000 fine applies from 24 November to an unregistered or unmicrochipped pet; microchipping is free at six corporation veterinary centres.

The uptake is the number to watch. Four days before the deadline 'only about 31 per cent out of the city's estimated 1 lakh pet owners have obtained the licences', with around 31,000 applications filed; by February 2026 the corporation 'has issued 73,754 pet licences so far', had microchipped every registered dog, had set 7 December as the microchipping cut-off, had fined defaulters Rs 5,000 each and 'collected Rs 7.11 lakh in fines', and one dispensary that had implanted 1,812 chips was seeing fewer than ten requests a week. That is more licences than Mumbai, Delhi or Hyderabad publishes, and the fine did it. Bonbeno's guide to dog registration in India walks the portal beside every other city's, and the metro guide covers what the Chennai Metro allows.

Veterinary care: a state network of 3,869 institutions and 245 mobile units, and 23 private clinics of which 2 never close

Tamil Nadu's government veterinary system is among the best staffed in the country. Chennai's round-the-clock private layer is the thinnest of the eight cities.

Tamil Nadu had 6,610 registered veterinary practitioners on 31 March 2024, the third-largest register in India, and 3,465 sanctioned government doctor posts with 345 vacant, 10 percent, against 38.5 percent in Maharashtra. Its 3,869 government institutions are 182 veterinary hospitals and polyclinics, 2,766 dispensaries and 921 aid centres, and its 245 mobile veterinary units under the central scheme are exactly the one per lakh of livestock the norm asks for. Bonbeno's Vet Access Index ranks the state on 3,707 livestock per registered vet, among the best-served; in the city the Madras Veterinary College's teaching hospital at Vepery is the government facility pets actually reach.

The private layer: 23 clinics, 2 of them 24-hour clinics, both the college's

Bonbeno's vet directory for Chennai, each entry checked against its Google listing on 16 October 2026 for an address, a live phone number and the hours the clinic itself publishes, lists 23 clinics and hospitals, 2 of which publish round-the-clock opening, and both are the Madras Veterinary College's: its emergency and critical care unit and its hospital at Vepery. No private clinic on the list publishes 24-hour hours, the fewest of the eight cities, Mumbai, Delhi, Bengaluru, Hyderabad, Chennai, Pune, Kolkata and Ahmedabad, against Bengaluru's 18. Twelve of the 23 are rated 4.5 or higher and 6,278 Google reviews sit behind an average of 4.30; 8 have a website. The directory's method note explains why the list is short: the pull returned 48 records and 25 were dropped, 'two KFC branches, a five-star hotel, two serviced-apartment buildings, two restaurants' and a human PET scan unit among them, the least accurate search of any city.

The Google Maps pulls were thin too. The 'pet grooming' search of 2 November 2026 returned only 47 listings, 14 of them pet groomers and 19 pet stores, and the 'pet boarding' search 30, with 13 boarding, day-care or kennel listings and one cat boarding service; every other city returned 100 for each. What a consultation, a vaccination or a surgery costs is in Bonbeno's guide to what a vet visit costs in India.

Shops, groomers and boarders: 177 Google Maps listings, 17 shop names that sell animals, and the one state register with a number

Chennai's pet retail returns fewer listings than any city but Ahmedabad, and its state is the only one whose pet shop register can be read.

Of the first 100 Google Maps results for 'pet shop' in Chennai, 74 are pet stores or pet supply stores, 12 are aquarium or bird shops, 4 are groomers or clinics and 10 are not pet businesses at all; 80 are rated, the median listing has 20 reviews, the fewest of the eight cities, 62.5 percent score 4.5 or higher, 27 percent have a website, 6 are marked temporarily closed, 13 claim 24-hour opening and 17 names advertise live animals, puppies or birds. Heads Up For Tails appears twice. The grooming pull found 14 pet groomers in 47 results, a median of 65 reviews and 75 percent at 4.5 or higher; the boarding pull 13 boarding, day-care or kennel listings in 30, 72.4 percent of the rated ones at 4.5 or higher and 5 claiming 24-hour opening. Bonbeno's dog grooming cost guide and boarding versus a pet sitter cover the prices and the choice.

Registered pet shops: 399 on the state's list, 373 past their expiry

Every shop that sells an animal needs a certificate from the Tamil Nadu Animal Welfare Board under the Pet Shop Rules, 2018, which the state published with its own application form. The Board's register, read on 1 November 2026, holds 399 entries, 309 of them registered in 2020, and 373 of the 399 are past the expiry date printed beside them; its breeder register holds six entries, all registered in 2026. After a pit bull attack in August 2025 the state gave breeders and shops until 30 September to register, a Board member saying Chennai has more than 100 illegal breeding centres Deccan Chronicle, and in February 2026 extended registration to boarding centres, grooming facilities and trainers. Bonbeno's pet shops report reads the register district by district.

When a pet dies: a free municipal pet crematorium at Kannammapet, 439 cremations in its first three months

Chennai's corporation opened its pet crematorium in October 2025, and by January it was cremating five pets a day.

The Greater Chennai Corporation's pet crematorium at Kannammapet in T Nagar 'has cremated 439 deceased pets since it began operations in October 2025', and 'was constructed for Rs 50 lakh under the Singara Chennai 2.0 project'; the corporation also keeps pet burial grounds at Moolakotthalam in Royapuram zone, Mylapore in Teynampet zone and Kannammapet in Kodambakkam zone. The service 'is entirely free', runs 'daily from 8:00 AM to 5:00 PM', takes cats and dogs, and returns the ashes to owners who want them.

Of the eight cities, Chennai and Mumbai's Malad are the two municipal pet crematoria that cost the owner nothing, against Delhi's Rs 2,000 and Rs 3,000 and Hyderabad's operator-set charge, as Bonbeno's city reports record. The steps, the paperwork and the private options are in Bonbeno's guide to what to do when your pet dies in India.

What a Chennai pet owner can do with these numbers

Seven things that follow from the record, in the order a new owner meets them.

1. License the dog for Rs 50 and get it microchipped free at a corporation centre. The fine is Rs 5,000 and the corporation has collected it. Renew on the vaccination date; the portal reminds you three times.
2. Know that only the veterinary college is open all night. Both 24-hour entries in the Chennai vet directory are the Madras Veterinary College's at Vepery; phone before you drive.
3. Vaccinate against rabies on schedule and treat every bite as urgent. The state counted 40 rabies deaths in 2024 and the vaccine takes seven days to work.
4. Leash and muzzle in public, and expect it to be checked. The corporation's resolution requires both, with a Rs 5,000 fine for Pit Bull and Rottweiler owners who do not.
5. Report an unsterilised dog to the corporation, which now has 11 centres to send it to. Three dogs in four were unsterilised in 2024, and the programme is at 200 a day.
6. Buy animals only from a shop on the Board's register, and check the expiry date beside its entry. 373 of 399 have lapsed; the pet shops report lists what to ask.
7. Know the crematorium. Kannammapet in T Nagar, free, 8 am to 5 pm.

What this data does not measure

Each figure here was produced for a different purpose by a different office, and the limits travel with them.

• The survey's zone table is only partly published. The report names the three highest and the lowest zones and six sterilised shares; the other eleven zones are in the corporation's report, which this report could not reach.
• The city's bite count is a stated average, not a series. '25,000 to 30,000 a year' is the health officer's figure; The Federal's 5.25 lakh for Chennai in 2025 is on the state's scale and is printed as reported.
• The state's two bite series disagree by more than five lakh for 2022, 8,83,213 against 3,64,435, and agree to within eight cases for 2023; the report prints both and does not know which 2022 is right.
• The sterilisation programme publishes daily rates, not totals. 115, 200 and 400 a day are statements on three dates; no annual count of dogs sterilised since the survey has been published.
• The licence figures count licences, not dogs, and the 1 lakh pet owners the 31 percent is measured against is an estimate; the 73,754 is the corporation's count in February 2026 and has grown since.
• The crematorium's hours and its being free come from a pet-services site, not from the corporation; the cremation count and cost are DT Next's.
• The directory is a window, not a census. Chennai's 23 listings come from a 48-record pull with 25 dropped; the Google Maps pulls are the first results for one search term each, returned short for grooming and boarding, classified by Google's category field, and a 24-hour claim is unverified.

How this report was built

Every figure was read from the document cited, and the Google Maps layer was produced by scripts kept with the report.

1. The survey figures are from DT Next's report of 21 September 2024; the census figure from the Rajya Sabha reply used in Bonbeno's street dog report.
2. The state bite and rabies series are from DT Next's report of 2 January 2025 and Annexures I and II to the Lok Sabha reply of 1 April 2025 as published by the Press Information Bureau; the 2025 figures from ETV Bharat's report of 16 September 2025 and The Federal's of 20 November 2025; the vaccination total from Adyar Times of 19 September 2025.
3. The sterilisation centres and rates are from Adyar Times of 19 September 2025, DT Next of 20 June 2026 and the Deccan Chronicle of 23 August 2026; the Supreme Court order from All India Radio's report of 7 November 2025 and the corporation's compliance from IANS's report of 10 February 2026.
4. The licence rules and uptake are from Citizen Matters of 11 November 2025, The Federal of 20 November 2025, IANS of 24 February 2026 and the Deccan Herald of 19 December 2025. The crematorium is from DT Next of 20 January 2026 and CarryMyPet's report of its opening. The pet shop record is the Tamil Nadu Animal Welfare Board's registers and the reports used in Bonbeno's pet shops report Tamil Nadu Animal Welfare Board Government of Tamil Nadu DT Next, 'TN govt sets September 30… Deccan Chronicle Deccan Chronicle. The state veterinary figures are the Lok Sabha and Rajya Sabha replies used in the Vet Access Index Open Government Data Platform India Lok Sabha, Unstarred Question 1287.
5. The private clinic figures are counts over Bonbeno's Chennai directory file as checked on 16 October 2026. The Google Maps layer is three Apify runs of the Google Maps Scraper, 'pet shop' on 1 November 2026 and 'pet grooming' and 'pet boarding' on 2 November 2026, 100 results requested each, classified by Google's primary category by the summary scripts in the research folder.