chennai most common doubt that police officials have when they get a complaint on stray dogs is whether it is legal to feed the dogs or not that and many other such doubts on strays and wildlife were cleared at the training session that was held on saturday for more than 400 police inspectors and recently promoted deputy superintendent of police officials laws related to animals landmark judgement from high court and supreme court relating to animal welfare and commonly faced issues by police on field were the main topics as cases of cruelty against animals are on the rise with stray dogs and cats being killed by private entities we held training sessions for the police officials on the prevention of cruelty to animals act 1960 and various section of indian penal code such as sections 428 and 429 that deal with injuring animals we also brushed upon the wildlife laws and in many cases schedule birds are seized said sai vignesh an animal activist who was one of the trainees antony rubin member state wildlife board and an animal activist stated over the years awareness on animal acts was increasing more police officials are booking cases now we wanted to help clear their doubts on various acts and inform them about various high court and supreme court judgments that would help them deal with such cruelty cases in a better manner he saidthis was the third such training session held in the past one year the first session was held for 90 dsp tarinee officials and the second one for sub inspectors of police trainees this was the first time that inspectors and dsps who are dealing with such cases were sensitized on animal welfare laws in tamil nadu police academy such training will empower them to take action whenever they come across a case of animal cruelty since police and spca are enforcing agencies recently several dogs were killed inside a governemnt building under the retext of animal birth control programme a provate hospital in madurai and one in chennai killed cats and dogs in the name of relocating them sai vignesh said all these were illegal and even relocating dogs is not allowed they were every receptive and many shared their difficulties that they faced in such cases especially in cattle trafficking dog feeding by residential welfare associations and other issues said sai vignesh selvan nagarathinam deputy directortraining tn police academy said since there is better reporting of animal cruelty and animal abuse it is imperative to equip the officiers at the police station level to have legal knowldege and also ethical and moral aspects of the issues that they are handlign with whenever such instances happen the kind of empathy and sensitivity they need to show was highlighted in the workshop the session was for over three hours he said