Indian city bans children from walking alone after seven children are mauled to death by stray dogs in a month

Saga prompted fury, with locals using the young girl's dead body to block National Highway 24 in India

The district administration ordered restrictions to be implemented on movement of children outside their homes without adult chaperones (AFP)

A northern Indian city has banned children from walking alone after a 10-year-old girl was mauled to death by a dog in the seventh such death in the last month.

Reena was visiting a mango orchard with three other girls in the Khairabad village in the Sitapur district when a pack of dogs attacked the children, locals told police, according to the Times of India.

Locals are said to have then rushed to rescue them from the nearby village of Mahespur-Chillawar. While the three other girls managed to survive the ordeal, Reena was badly bitten and villagers were forced to inform her father that she had died.

The district administration ordered restrictions to be implemented on the movement of children outside their homes without adult chaperones.

"Block development officers, gram pradhans, lekhpals, doctors, teachers and kotedars will set up committees to ensure no child goes out without any elder,” Sitapur district magistrate Sheetal Verma told the Indian English daily newspaper, referring to local officials.

The saga prompted fury in the area and a mob clutching lathias – long heavy wooden sticks used as a weapon in India – used the young girl's dead body to block National Highway 24 in India.

Police charged demonstrators, who had been pelting stones, in an effort to defuse the rally.

"The administration is in a slumber. We will be forced to take law into our hands and kill the dogs,” Reena's uncle, Karan, said.

District police chief Sureshrao A Kulkarni, said: "Reena's body has been sent for postmortem. We've sought deployment of more police teams for combing operations in the village."

The young girl’s death is the 13th such incident to take place since November 2017, in and around the town of Sitapur in northern India.

Villagers have been left terrified – keeping their children at home and killing dogs they encounter – after roaming packs of feral dogs have led to a spate of child deaths in recent months.

Education officials say some schools have seen a substantial drop in attendance due to the attacks. Parents have also been told to escort their children to and from school.

It is not clear why the stray dogs in the area have unexpectedly turned into killers.

Many villagers have heaped blame on the closure of an illegal slaughterhouse in the area which provided food for the animals. However, the slaughterhouse was shut down at least six months before the first mauling casualty was reported last November.

It was not clear how many dogs were involved in the attacks but India has millions of strays that wander the streets in even the most expensive and exclusive areas. The feral dogs often subsist on leftover food set in alleys for them but also experience persistent cruelty by individuals.

Despite the fact injuries from dog attacks are relatively common, a slew of fatalities in one particular area is rare.