No ‘gau raksha’ here, 30 cattle starve to death in AP district
Around 30 cattle, including cows, have starved to death at a shelter in Andhra Pradesh, officials said, highlighting the neglect animals face while people are being killed in the name of cow protection.
Officials on Wednesday found decomposed carcasses rotting away in heaps of dung on the premises of the Society for Prevention of Cruelty towards Animals (SPCA) shelter at Kakinada in East Godavari district.
“We have recovered 14 carcasses of cattle believed to have died on Tuesday. Four more cattle died on Wednesday,” joint director of animal husbandry V Venkateshwar Rao told HT.
Those which survived were in a bad shape. Twenty-two were moved to “safer locations” on Wednesday, while some more were to be shifted out on Thursday. Rao said 10-12 cattle died earlier but the bodies seemed to have been removed by the organisers.
Independent sources, however, said 11 animals died on Wednesday alone.
“There was no fodder and water at the centre and the cattle have apparently been starving for quite some time,” Rao said.
The animals that survived were virtually in “skin-to-bone condition and were not even in a position to take intravenous fluids and injections”, said Rao, who was part of a team of officials from the animal husbandry, revenue and municipal departments that visited the shelter. There were no protective sheds and more than 450 cattle were crammed in the space meant for 200, he said.
“There was no attempt to clean the premises, which had kneedeep dung and slush. Heavy rains in the past two days made their condition worse,” Rao said.
SPCA joint secretary Gopal R Surabathula admitted that 20 cattle died in the past few days, but said officials were exaggerating the figures.