New Delhi: The National Crime Records Bureau (NCRB) has for the first time recorded cases pertaining to the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals Act, 1960, with 9,039 cases registered in 2024. Released Wednesday by the Ministry of Home Affairs, the NCRB report, called Crime in India 2024, says that 10,312 persons were arrested under the law in the year.
The chargesheet rate stood at 96.7 percent, with a conviction rate of 80.5 percent, the report adds. The data also shows that 147 cases were dropped over insufficient evidence or untraced clues, and two were abated during investigation. Abatement refers to termination of legal proceedings, usually because of the death of the accused or on technical grounds.
Cruelty to animals—usually killing, poisoning, or maiming—is a criminal offence under the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals Act, 1960, and Section 325 of the Bharatiya Nyaya Sanhita (BNS). The punishment can go up to five years in jail.
The NCRB data shows that 2,215 people have been convicted for cruelty to animals, with the conviction rate at 93.8 percent in metropolitan cities. The pendency percentage, or cases that remain pending in courts, stands at 82.2 percent.
The data also shows 8,660 cases of animal theft, cumulatively valued at Rs 48.8 crore; a recovery rate of 44.9 percent means almost half of these stolen animals were traced and returned to their owners.
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Formal recognition
The NCRB report for 2024 does away with the older practice of grouping cases pertaining to cruelty to animals under general Special and Local Laws (SLL).
The data now tracks animal cruelty cases across the full criminal justice chain, from First Information Report and investigation through chargesheet and court disposal, “giving India its first national-level statistical picture of how animal cruelty offences are handled by the system,” said Shreemoyee Chakraborty from People For Animals. Having for long campaigned to get formal recognition of animal cruelty in India’s national crime data, Chakraborty called the inclusion a turning point for both animal welfare and public safety.
“The inclusion of this data marks the formal recognition of crimes against animals within India’s official crime data framework and enables systematic tracking of enforcement across states and Union Territories. It also creates, for the first time, a dataset that can be analysed alongside other crime categories,” said Chakraborty.
Calling the inclusion a “historic step”, Chakraborty added that globally, research has “consistently identified links between animal cruelty and interpersonal violence, including domestic abuse and other serious crimes”.
“The availability of national data opens the possibility of examining such patterns within the Indian context and strengthening preventive approaches to crime,” she further said.
Animal welfare activist Gauri Maulekhi agreed, taking to social media platform X to call the release of the NCRB report for 2024 a “historic moment for India”. She wrote, “For the first time, the NCRB has officially recorded crimes against animals in India’s national crime statistics. Animals are finally being counted. Thank you to Shri @AmitShah ji, the @HMOIndia, and the NCRB for this landmark step. Now we build on this.”
(Edited by Nardeep Singh Dahiya)
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