A truck full of dead buffalo calves was among the vehicles confiscated by the police last month during a rescue operation. Now, the non-government organisations involved in the rescue are fighting to keep the surviving animals from being returned to the owners.
On June 22, Union Women and Child Development Minister Maneka Gandhi’s NGO People For Animals intercepted 21 trucks at ITO. The trucks were dangerously overloaded with buffaloes, calves, and goats and sheep. The animals were sent to the Sanjay Gandhi Animal Care Centre, where they are recovering from the injuries inflicted during the transit.
“These animals were on their way to Jammu & Kashmir. Many of them were already dead at the time of the rescue, while the others were badly injured,” said the Sanjay Gandhi Animal Care Centre director Ambika Shukla.
According to Dilip Suri, who works with the centre, there were 157 buffalo calves, 70 adult buffaloes, and 215 goats and sheep — all tied up and packed into these trucks. A light commercial vehicle, which has a load carrying capacity of 2.25 tonne, is supposed to carry only two adult cattle or 20 goats or sheep. The intercepted trucks were carrying about 15-20 adult cattle and 40 small ones. One truck was loaded with 20 buffalo calves, all of which died before the rescue.
A total of 83 buffaloes and calves died the same night, along with 82 goats and sheep. The surviving animals have a slew of problems, including broken bones from being tied up for too long and “dead” hooves from lack of circulation.
“We usually get six to eight trucks per month, but this raid was a huge one. Butchers who transport these animals usually want to cut costs. So they pack in more animals than the permissible limit. They even create double-decker spaces by adding a wooden partition so that more cattle can be squeezed in,” added Mr. Suri.
Confusion over police jurisdiction makes matters worse at times.
“After rescuing the animals, we can’t attend to them or take them to a shelter for medical help because the owners file robbery cases against us.”
Therefore, rescuers have to wait for the police control vans to turn up and then figure out which police station the case can be registered in.
“In this case, 13 cases were registered at one police station and eight in another,” said Mr. Suri.
In cases like the one above, the centre files legal petitions to keep the animals. With regard to the June 22 rescue, they have been asked to come to the Tis Hazari court to present the post-mortem reports of the animals.
“The butchers are seeking a release order, but we will fight it. Animals ke liye kuchh bhi karega ,” said Mr. Suri.
