By IANS,
New Delhi : Following a complaint that cattle in north Delhi were posing threat to commuters and especially to school children, the municipal authority here Monday orchestrated a special raid, impounding 87 stray cows in the Civil Lines Zone.
Cattle catching vehicles along with staff of Delhi’s largest civic authority, Municipal Corporation of Delhi (MCD) raided Rajpura, Jahangirpuri, Adarsh Nagar, Kingsway Camp and other areas.
“A total of 87 cattle were seized, which were micro-chipped (for tracking them) at the Timarpur Cattle Pond,” said Deep Mathur, spokesperson MCD.
The cattle were subsequently deported to the Dabur Hare Krishna Gosadan, a cattle shed run with state government and municipal authority funds in northwest Delhi.
The cows, like many others found roaming free on Delhi’s roads, were owned by a dairy in Civil Lines that houses 5,000 cattle. Many a time, the owners release the cows on the streets to roam and graze during daytime after milking them in the morning, sources in the MCD said.
Since April 2002 to Oct 31 2008, the municipal authority has impounded 97,714 cattle from various parts of Delhi.
The efforts by the authorities are in cohesion with widespread incidents of cattle havoc in the capital – the latest being a stray cow killing a 65-year-old man and injuring three others in June.
The MCD was also directed by the high court in September, to give Rs.200,000 to the widow of a victim of another such incident in 2006.
A Delhi court had in the past even placed a bounty of Rs.2,000 for catching and helping authorities impound stray cows.
The MCD itself spends over Rs.40-50 million annually on the cowsheds, to ensure that the cows are well taken care of and not released on the roads again.
Officials and municipal authorities hope to rein in the cattle chaos in time for the 2010 Commonwealth Games, when Delhi will play host to over a million visitors.