Baroda had a law in place to tackle stray cattle menace 143 years ago

VADODARA: Urban civic bodies across Gujarat, including Vadodara Municipal Corporation (VMC), are struggling to deal with stray cattle on the roads. But few know that the erstwhile Baroda state had launched a massive crackdown on the menace 143 years ago looking at the damage to farms and threat to people's lives due to unattended cattle.

An order to impound stray cattle and penalize its owners was first issued in 1876 in the Gaekwad rule. The bovines were impounded in carriages and the owners, who left them unattended on the roads, were penalized heavily. In fact, visionary ruler Maharaja Sayajirao Gaekwad III doubled the penalty in 1892.

Approval for this was sought from the then chief justice of Baroda High Court Ambalal Sakarlal Desai, who signed the criminal notification on June 8, 1892.

This little known fact has been revealed from the study carried out by Kamini Rao, a PhD scholar who has studied contributions of Ambalal Desai in the social, educational and economic development of Gujarat. Rao did her PhD under the guidance of historian Dr Rizwan Kadri.

"In Petlad taluka and Vadodara city, people are leaving their cows and other cattle astray. The cattle are entering into farms and damaging farm produce. Not only that it is also causing bodily damages to people for which proper bandobast is required," the proceedings of the Baroda High Court state.

Penalty was doubled on administrator’s request

The suba saheb (administrator) of Baroda state had sent a proposal to ruler of Baroda state (inward number 100 on January 16, 1892). The proposal states that based on clause 11 of order passed by Baroda state on May 8, 1876 such cattle should be impounded in carriages and penalty and charges collected from defaulters should be doubled,” the Baroda High Court documents mention.

Based on the administrator’s request, Sayajirao issued an order to double the penalty and charges collected from such cattle owners. The then diwan of Baroda state issued the necessary order for the same on May 23, 1892 and legal opinion of the Baroda High Court was sought by the ruler.

“We are passing the order whereby double penalty can be collected from such cattle owners in Petlad taluka and Vadodara city,” the order issued by Ambalal Desai, then chief justice of Baroda state on June 8, 1892, reads.

As chief justice, Ambalal had passed other orders on March 24, 1893 and June 15, 1893 whereby the law was extended to Dabhoi, Navsari, Gandevi, Bilimora and Bhadran – all of which were part of Baroda state.