On 11 August 2025, the Supreme Court Bench of Justices Pardiwala and Mahadevan directed the Delhi Government, the Municipal Corporation of Delhi, and the authorities of the NCR (Noida, Gurugram, Ghaziabad, Faridabad) to pick up stray dogs and relocate them to shelters and pounds within eight weeks of the date of the order. On 14 August 2025, the Supreme Court reserved its order on pleas seeking a stay of the directions issued by the two-judge Bench on 11 August 2025. Amid this, a distressing video (here, here) showing a group of men removing the bodies of dogs from black plastic bags has gone viral on social media, with claims that it depicts the mass killing of stray dogs in Delhi following the Supreme Court directive to relocate them to shelters within eight weeks across the Delhi-NCR region. This article fact-checks the claim made in the post.
Claim: The video shows the mass killing of stray dogs in Delhi, following the Supreme Court directive to relocate them to shelters within eight weeks across the Delhi-NCR region.
Fact: This viral video has no connection to Delhi or India. It shows an incident that occurred in Ca Mau Province, southern Vietnam, where the dead bodies of 12 dogs were recovered from two men arrested on suspicion of stealing dogs. Hence the claim made in the post is FALSE.
To verify the details of the viral video, we conducted a Google reverse image search using keyframes from the clip. This search led us to a longer version of the video uploaded on Facebook on 5 August 2025 by a Vietnamese user. The post description, translated from Vietnamese into English, reads: “Professional group of dog thieves in Gia Rai Ward, Ca Mau.”
Following this lead, we conducted a relevant keyword search, which led us to a news report titled “2 arrested in southern Vietnam for organised dog theft, 12 dogs found dead”, published by the Vietnamese media outlet Tuoi Tre News on 5 August 2025. The report carried visuals similar to those seen in the viral video. According to the report, police in Ca Mau Province, southern Vietnam, arrested two men suspected of stealing dogs across Gia Rai Ward and seized 12 dead dogs along with several tools commonly used in pet theft. The suspects were identified as Lam Hai Trung, 37, and Quach Dung Binh, 45, both residing in Ca Mau.
We also found multiple other Vietnamese media reports showing the same visuals as seen in the viral video (here, here). From this, it is evident that the viral video is not from Delhi and instead depicts an incident that occurred in Vietnam.
On 28 July 2025, the Supreme Court Bench of Justices Pardiwala and Mahadevan took suo moto cognisance of a news report published in the Times of India’s Delhi edition, titled “City Hounded by Strays, Kids Pay Price”, which reported the death of six-year-old Chavi Sharma in Delhi’s Pooth Kalan following a stray dog attack. She had succumbed to rabies after multiple bites. The Bench noted that the news item contained “very disturbing and alarming” figures and facts.
On 11 August 2025, the Supreme Court Bench of Justices Pardiwala and Mahadevan directed the Delhi Government, the Municipal Corporation of Delhi, and the authorities of the NCR (Noida, Gurugram, Ghaziabad, Faridabad) to pick up stray dogs and relocate them to shelters and pounds within eight weeks of the date of the order. The Court also warned of legal action against anyone obstructing the process.
Following this order, several Interlocutory Applications (IAs) were filed in the top court seeking a recall of the order. The IAs raised concerns over the lack of infrastructure to implement the order and its potential health consequences. The case was relisted on 14 August 2025 before a three-judge Supreme Court Bench comprising Justices Vikram Nath, Sandeep Mehta, and N.V. Anjaria. After hearing the IAs, the Bench reserved its interim order.
To sum it up, a video from Vietnam is misattributed to Delhi, claiming that stray dogs are being killed following the Supreme Court directive.
