Stray dogs in Mizoram, 2026: 69 counted in 2019 and none in 2012, 39,778 dogs in households, a rabies plan that says the state has no free-roaming strays, 1,131 to 2,100 dog bites a year by the state's count and 1,873 in 2024 by the national table, no rabies laboratory, a 2020 law that took dogs off the slaughter list, Aizawl's pet rules and pet cemetery, and the most vets per head of any state

Stray dogs in Mizoram: the state's numbers on one page

Mizoram is the one state where the census, the health department and the city all say there are almost no stray dogs. Sixteen rows, from fourteen sources.

Two rows carry the weight. The state's own rabies plan says 'Mizoram does not have free roaming stray dogs', and the census agrees, with 69 counted in 2019 Rajya Sabha, Starred Question 190; yet the same plan counts between 1,131 and 2,100 dog bites a year. The rest of this report is about a state whose dog problem is its owned dogs, and whose rabies record is thin partly because nothing in the state can test for the virus.

How many stray dogs Mizoram has: 69 in the census, 39,778 dogs at home, and a plan that says none

Every source agrees that Mizoram's dogs live in households, and none has counted them recently.

The 19th Livestock Census of 2012 recorded no stray dogs in Mizoram, rural or urban, and the 20th Livestock Census of 2019 recorded 69, with 70 stray cattle Rajya Sabha, Starred Question 190. That is 0.1 stray dogs for every 1,000 people, against 11.5 for India, 10.4 for Maharashtra, 17.3 for Karnataka and 5.8 for Tamil Nadu, and only Manipur, Lakshadweep and Dadra and Nagar Haveli, which counted none in 2019, sit lower. The same 2012 census counted 39,778 dogs in Mizoram households, 22,999 rural and 16,779 urban, out of 1,16,72,617 across India, so the state's dogs are owned dogs. A 2023 survey of 800 pet owners in Aizawl district, reading the 2019 census, put Mizoram's dogs at '99.90%' pet and '0.10%' stray. The state's rabies plan of 2024 goes further: 'Mizoram does not have free roaming stray dogs', and its dog population management section reads 'Not Available due to absence of stray dogs in the State'. Aizawl's account is more careful: the city 'does not face the issue of large numbers of stray dogs roaming the streets' but 'does have a significant number of neglected, abandoned, and abused dogs and cats'. No census of owned dogs has been published since 2012, though the plan says the Aizawl Municipal Corporation is 'collecting dog population census along with their vaccination history'. Bonbeno's street dog report explains how a census by one informant per village produces counts this small.

Dog bites and rabies: 1,131 to 2,100 a year by the state, 1,873 in 2024 by the national table, and no laboratory

Mizoram has four bite series from three offices, and they do not agree with each other or, in one case, with themselves.

The state rabies plan counts 2,100 dog bites in 2018, 2,030 in 2019, 1,592 in 2020, 1,131 in 2021 and 1,418 in 2022, with the columns for people given post-exposure vaccine left 'NA'. The IDSP table laid before the Lok Sabha gives Mizoram 891 bites in 2022, 1,141 in 2023, 1,873 in 2024 and 179 in January 2025, and no suspected rabies death in any year; for 2022 the state's count is 1.6 times the national one. On the IDSP figure Mizoram recorded 149.8 bites per lakh people in 2024 against 265.7 for India, 381.1 for Maharashtra, 530.7 for Karnataka, 623.2 for Tamil Nadu and 115.9 for Delhi, and its count rose 110.2 percent from 2022 to 2024. An older record from the Economics and Statistics Department counted 3,397 people bitten by dogs in 2016-17, 1,363 of them women, and one person who 'died due to dog bite'. The Health Department's own district table for 2023-24, drawn from the IHIP, prints a total of 1,077 dog bites while its eleven district rows add up to 1,349, and Siaha's 296 is the same figure as Aizawl's; both numbers are given here. Lunglei reported the most, 407. Bonbeno's dog bite report prints the IDSP series for every state.

Rabies: rarely reported, and never tested

The plan records one clinically suspected human rabies case in 2018 and one in 2022, and no laboratory-confirmed case in any year; the IDSP table records no suspected rabies death in 2022. The two describe different events, a suspected case and a death, and are printed side by side. 'Currently there is no laboratory for testing of human or animal rabies cases' in Mizoram, the plan says, and 'there is no data on the number of animal deaths due to rabies in the State'. Rabies was declared a notifiable disease in the state on 9 May 2023. The plan's own audit of nine hospital anti-rabies clinics found staff trained in bite management only at Zoram Medical College and 'NIL' at the other eight, and the Health Department recorded the vaccine in stock at 44.82 percent of facilities in 2023-24 against a target of 80 percent; it bought 4,440 vials of anti-rabies vaccine and 100 of serum for 2024-25. Mizoram has not been declared rabies-free by anyone in the documents read; when a rabies outbreak was reported in Manipur's Churachandpur district in April 2025, Saitual's district magistrate banned the import of dogs into the district for two months.

Dogs, slaughter and the law: the 2020 Act, Kolasib's feasts and Aizawl's prohibition

Mizoram changed its law on dog meat by statute, which is what Nagaland's High Court said Nagaland had failed to do.

The Mizoram Animal Slaughter (Amendment) Bill, 2020 was introduced and passed by the Legislative Assembly on 4 March 2020 and became Mizoram Act No. 3 of 2020, published in Mizoram Gazette No. 193 of 21 April 2020; it passed unanimously and removed dogs from the animals permitted for slaughter. EastMojo's account is that the 2013 Act had listed dogs as cattle, a classification the State Animal Welfare Board opposed, and that the amendment said dogs 'should not be categorised as cattle'. Humane Society International welcomed it and asked the government 'to ban the sale and consumption of dog meat too'. In September 2023 the Kolasib Deputy Commissioner banned 'the inclusion of dog meat in any feasts and gatherings within the district' at the Board's request, and the Aizawl Municipal Corporation's Pet (Dog and Cat) Regulations state that 'the slaughtering and consumption of dog meat is explicitly prohibited', punishable under section 325 of the Bharatiya Nyaya Sanhita, up to five years, and section 11 of the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals Act. Enforcement shows up in the record: in September 2025 police arrested four men in Zuangtui, Aizawl, who had stolen a nursing dog and 'slaughtered the animal and consumed its meat'. A Bangladeshi paper reported in February 2026, citing unnamed local sources, that dogs from Rangamati are smuggled to Mizoram and sold for '10 to 12 thousand taka' each; that is an allegation, and no Indian source read confirms it.

Why Nagaland's ban fell and Mizoram's stands

Nagaland banned the commercial import and trading of dogs and the sale of dog meat on 4 July 2020 by a Chief Secretary's notification, and the Gauhati High Court's Kohima bench quashed it in 2023 because the Chief Secretary was not the competent authority and the ban rested on no legislation. Animal welfare groups appealed, a two-judge bench split on 22 April 2026, and the case went to the Chief Justice, so that ruling is not yet final. Mizoram's change is an Act of its Assembly, and no court order against it was found. Bonbeno's Nagaland report carries that state's record.

Who pays after a bite: the owner, not the state

No state compensation scheme for dog bite victims was found in Mizoram, unlike Haryana's Rs 10,000 per tooth mark or Karnataka's Rs 5,000 per bite. Aizawl's regulations make the owner of a pet dog that bites 'fully responsible for all medical expenses', including emergency treatment, hospitalisation, follow-up care and transport, plus a fine the corporation fixes, and failure to pay can lead to action under section 291 of the Bharatiya Nyaya Sanhita, 'imprisonment for 6 months or a fine of Rs 5000 or both', and seizure of the dog. Saitual's April 2025 order set the same six months or Rs 5,000 for an owner whose dog bites. In February 2024 a pitbull mauled a seven-year-old girl's cheeks and lips in Kawnpui, Kolasib district, and was euthanised.

The Animal Birth Control programme and the courts: none needed, a shelter in Aizawl, and the Supreme Court's orders

A state with 69 counted strays has no sterilisation programme to report, and the national orders reach it through one city agreement.

No Animal Birth Control count, contract or budget for Mizoram was found, and the state plan marks dog population management as not applicable. Aizawl's regulations provide that stray dogs and cats be 'sterilized and immunized' as far as practicable with animal welfare organisations, that local councils set up a shelter or pound, and that unregistered or unattended pets found on the street are liable to capture, with two days for the owner to claim them before rehoming. On 30 October 2025 the Aizawl Municipal Corporation signed a one-year agreement with JB Foundation to implement the Supreme Court's orders: the corporation catches stray, abandoned and abused dogs and the JB Foundation shelter at Bung Bangla, Tuirial is the official facility; the Dog Catcher Squad's first survey ran on 4 and 5 December. The orders it cites are those of 22 August 2025, which laid down nationwide guidelines and required shelters, and 7 November 2025, which required inspections of schools, hospitals, sports complexes, bus terminals and railway stations at least once every three months; on 19 May 2026 the Court refused to recall its November directions and told authorities to 'confine such dogs to shelters'. No order of the Gauhati High Court's Aizawl bench on dogs in Mizoram was found.

Veterinary care: 379 vets, 30.3 per lakh people, and a third of posts empty

Mizoram has more registered vets for its people than any other state, and one of the higher vacancy rates in government service.

Mizoram had 379 registered veterinary practitioners on 31 March 2024, up from 332 in 2021, and 40 of its 115 sanctioned government veterinary doctor posts were vacant in December 2025, 34.8 percent against 25.8 percent for India. It runs 26 mobile veterinary units, all operational, and with 3,59,704 livestock in the 2019 census that is 7.2 units per lakh livestock, the highest in the country against India's 0.7, and 949 livestock per registered vet against India's 6,106. At 30.3 registered vets per lakh people Mizoram is ahead of every other state, and of India's 6.3, Maharashtra's 8.8, Tamil Nadu's 8.6, Karnataka's 7.5 and Delhi's 2.7. Its one recognised college is the College of Veterinary Sciences and Animal Husbandry at Selesih, Aizawl, which the state plan names as the referral laboratory for rabies samples until the state has its own. Private clinics in Aizawl must be licensed under the Mizoram Licensing and Regulation of Private Veterinary Hospitals and Clinics Rules, 2022 and registered with the corporation. Bonbeno's Vet Access Index ranks every state on the same arithmetic, and its vet directories cover eight cities (Mumbai, Delhi, Bengaluru, Chennai, Hyderabad, Pune, Kolkata and Ahmedabad), none in the northeast; what a consultation costs is in Bonbeno's guide to what a vet visit costs in India.

Pets and the rules: Aizawl's QR tags, muzzles, a breeder order, and a municipal pet cemetery

Mizoram's pet rules are written for a city of owned dogs, and they are among the most detailed in India.

Aizawl's Pet (Dog and Cat) Regulations, made under section 371 of the Mizoram Municipalities Act, 2007, require every dog and cat over three months to be registered with the corporation with proof of rabies vaccination, wear a QR code pet tag on its collar at all times, and be renewed every three years. Dogs must be leashed in public on a leash no longer than 6 feet, 'potentially aggressive breeds' must be muzzled, and on the 24 breeds a central expert committee identified the corporation 'shall fully comply' with the Ministry's notification. The regulations say they come into force on a date the corporation notifies; that date and the registration fee were not found published, and no count of registered pets was found. The Director of Animal Husbandry and Veterinary ordered on 5 February 2021 that 'no dog breeder in the State shall carry on or continue any breeding activity' without a certificate of registration, and Aizawl requires breeders and sellers to register with the corporation as well. The 2023 survey found that 69.80 percent of Aizawl pet owners vaccinated their pet after three months of age but only 47.80 percent did so every year. Bonbeno's guide to dog registration in India covers the portals that exist, and its pet shops report carries the Pet Shop Rules clause by clause.

Native breeds and end of life: none, and a municipal pet cemetery

No dog breed named for Mizoram is on ICAR's register of six Indian breeds, and no Mizoram breed appears in the Kennel Club of India's registrations by state in Bonbeno's data; the dog most households keep is a mixed breed or an Indian pariah dog, and Bonbeno's report on the register carries the six. Aizawl's regulations provide for a dead dog or cat to 'be buried in the Pet Cemetery run by the Aizawl Municipal Corporation or any privately established pet cemetery', and license private cemeteries for two years; burial fees are fixed by the corporation and were not published. Bonbeno's cremation report covers the eight directory cities, and its guide to when your pet dies in India covers the steps.

What a Mizoram pet owner can do with these numbers

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

1. Vaccinate your dog against rabies every year. Only 47.80 percent of surveyed Aizawl owners did, and Mizoram's bites come from owned dogs.
2. Register your dog or cat with the Aizawl Municipal Corporation and keep the QR tag on its collar. An untagged pet on the street can be captured.
3. Keep your dog leashed in public, and muzzled if it is a breed the rules call aggressive. A bite costs the owner every medical bill and up to Rs 5,000.
4. After a bite, go to the district hospital's anti-rabies clinic the same day. Vaccine was in stock at only 44.82 percent of facilities in 2023-24.
5. Buy a puppy only from a breeder that can show its registration certificate. The state has required one since February 2021.
6. Report a stray, abandoned or abused dog in Aizawl to the corporation. Its shelter partner is JB Foundation at Tuirial.
7. Ask the corporation about its pet cemetery before you need it. Burial fees were not published.

What this data does not measure

Mizoram is thinly documented, and several gaps are absences in the record rather than zeros.

• No count of owned dogs since 2012; the 2019 household dog figure for Mizoram was not found, and the 21st Livestock Census had published no state table by 11 November 2026.
• The four bite series are different instruments. The plan's 2022 count is 1.6 times the IDSP's; the Health Department's 2023-24 table prints a total that its own rows do not add up to; the 2016-17 figure comes through a news report of a departmental record. The dataset computes nothing across them.
• Rabies is unmeasured as much as absent. There is no laboratory in the state, no animal rabies data, and the plan's suspected cases and the IDSP's deaths count different events.
• No compensation actually paid, no fines collected, no registration count and no sterilisation figure were found for Mizoram or Aizawl.
• The date Aizawl's regulations came into force was not found; the corporation publishes them, and the file is stamped August 2025.
• The cross-border dog trade is an allegation from a Bangladeshi paper citing unnamed sources, and no Indian figure for the trade was found.
• No Gauhati High Court order on dogs in Mizoram was found, and no Mizoram compliance affidavit to the Supreme Court could be read. Pet spending per household is not here because the Household Consumption Expenditure Survey's unit-level data had not been obtained.

How this report was built

Every figure was read from the document cited, and the state rows are the same rows Bonbeno's national reports computed from the parliamentary annexes.

1. The census figures are from Tables 51 to 53 and 79 of the 19th Livestock Census and the Rajya Sabha statement of 6 August 2025, with the household survey from The Pharma Innovation Journal and Aizawl's account from India Today NE.
2. The bite and rabies figures are from the State Action Plan for Dog Mediated Rabies Elimination from Mizoram by 2030, the Health and Family Welfare Department's Rabies page, Annexure I and II to the Lok Sabha reply of 1 April 2025 and PTI via India Today NE; the plan and the department's page were downloaded and read in full.
3. The law and order figures are from the Mizoram Legislative Assembly's bill register, Deccan Chronicle, Humane Society International, EastMojo EastMojo, 'Tragic pitbull attack leaves…, the Aizawl Municipal Corporation's regulations, India Today NE India Today NE, 'Mizoram's Saitual bans dog…, Views Bangladesh, LiveLaw and News On AIR.
4. The veterinary figures are from the Lok Sabha replies Lok Sabha, Unstarred Question 1287 Lok Sabha, Unstarred Question 4449 and the VCI list; ratios are Bonbeno's Vet Access Index arithmetic.
5. The People Also Ask questions were captured on 11 November 2026 through an Apify run of Google's India results for 'stray dogs in aizawl'; the runs for the focus keyword and for 'dog bite cases in mizoram' returned no box.