Vehemently raising the issue of cattle smuggling during zero hour in Rajya Sabha, MP Mahesh Poddar today asked, “It is a matter of surprise that if someone talks about saving tigers, he is called social activist. If someone talks about saving dogs, he is called animal lover, but if someone talks about saving cattle, he is called a fundamentalist or a fanatic. Many times, the way of thinking becomes the reason of untoward incidents.”
Poddar further said, “In our country, smuggling of animal wealth and especially cattle animal wealth has become a big problem. Sadly, livestock trafficking is mostly done for cutting and for meat and leather business. The feelings of a large section of the country are hurt by such incidents, which often cause unpleasant incidents. In order to prevent such incidents, it is necessary that statutory and administrative restriction measures are needed to prevent total trafficking of animals. It is necessary to strictly implement strict rules.”
He said that the Supreme Court had directed the Environment Ministry to prepare a detailed plan to tackle the problem of animal trafficking in Bangladesh while disposing of the petition on the large scale smuggling of cross border animals on July 12, 2016.
Poddar told the House that illegal smuggling of animals is done through the open border with Bangladesh. There are markets and fairs in many border areas where animals are sent illegally to Nepal and Bangladesh. There are many other types of illegal activities that are operated by providing terror funding with the amount of money collected through animal trafficking.
India and Bangladesh border is more than 4,000 kilometres long, which is the fifth largest limit in the world. It is estimated that about 10 lakh cattle have been trafficked in Bangladesh every year from this border. After trafficking on the border, the cattle caught after leaving the auction again becomes the goods of smuggling.
It is also seen in Jharkhand that after the cattle stops producing milk, the owner sells the cattle-stock to the smugglers with a good value. About 42 lakh animals of Jharkhand have 70 percent cattle.
He said that the faith of a large community of the country is associated with bovine animals. This community gets excited when the information about smuggling of slaughter of slaughter is done. There are times also misunderstood and it is difficult for the people to differentiate between the purchase of cattle and their smuggling for animal husbandry work. There is a need to make the necessary provisions to make a clear difference in them.
In addition, the section of society is involved in the business for the slaughter of animals or slaughter of cattle, it is also expected to respect the feelings of the majority community.
