Pink City struggles to fight stray cattle menace

JAIPUR: Pink City, which was selected in the first list of smart cities, is struggling to deal with basic stray cattle menace on roads. Fear has gripped residents, especially children and elders, as the stray cattle has increased with a rise in the number of cows. Yet the Jaipur Municipal Corporation (JMC) is turning a blind eye to the problem.

The city approximately has a population of more than 35,000 stray cattle in 91 wards. The number is growing every day rapidly as the contractor is allegedly not catching these cows in absence of strict vigilance by the administration. Moreover, the JMC administration is also allegedly shielding the contractor and is not willing to take any action. Sources at JMC said that since November 2017, four notices to the contracted firm have been issued after it failed to adhere to the norms. In fact, in the past six months, two deaths have been recorded due to stray cattle menace.

However, no action has been taken so far. “Earlier, there were seven labourers deployed on one vehicle to catch the stray animals. The drive to catch stray animals in the city has been affected as the contractor is not providing adequate labourers. Only three labourers are being provided due to which desired number of stray cows cannot be taken to the shelter,” said an official source at JMC.

As per the contract, if stray cows are found roaming in the Walled City area, JMC can impose Rs 500 penalty per animal. But the JMC administration is in no mood to take any stringent action against the contractor. “To escape penalty, the contractor has not produced bills for the past four months. On May 24, final notice was issued to produce bills within three days. However, the contractor did not respond to the notice. On Monday, a recommendation to blacklist the firm will be forwarded to the JMC’s chief executive officer,” added the source.

On December 9, the single bench of Justice MN Bhandari gave the direction during the hearing of a suo motu petition by the court after an Argentinian citizen was gored to death. “The data of the last two years shows the municipal body caught about 17,000 stray animals in a year. Either the figure is fudged or the penalty of Rs 5,000 is too high so that the cattle owners did not turn up to claim the animals,” the court observed.