Stray cattle burn hole in MC pocket

Information procured under the RTI Act by a local municipal councillor, Kuljit Singh Bedi, has exposed the civic body’s inaction to tackle one of the major problems being faced by local residents.

Replying to Bedi’s questionnaire, the MC maintained that it had never framed any policy to tackle the stray cattle menace except for setting up a special wing comprising six MC employees, who were provided with a cattle catching vehicle, too.

Revealing that no land was earmarked for creating a cattle pound in the city, the MC blamed the Greater Mohali Area Development Authority (GMADA) for neither allotting any land nor creating any cattle pound while developing the city. “We had even written to GMADA officials in this regard,” said the MC public information officer (PIO).

The MC said from April 2009 to August 15, 2010, the MC special wing could catch only 426 stray cattle after using 448 litres of diesel in the vehicle and spending another Rs 2.73 lakh to feed the cattle for the period they were kept in MC’s custody.

However, the MC admitted that the captured stray cattle were kept only for a week with the MC, after which the unclaimed cattle were shifted to nearby pounds. 

Alleging a scam in the expenditure shown to catch and feed such a less number of stray cattle, Bedi accused the MC authorities concerned of “total inaction” to tackle the stray cattle menace, which was also posing great danger to motorists on the city roads.

“Non-availability of proper cattle pound, no policy to tackle the problem and spending three times more than the recovered fine speak volumes of civic officials’ lackadaisical approach towards the problem,” alleged Bedi, while announcing to take up the matter with GMADA officials to demand allocation of adequate land for developing cattle pound in Mohali.