The Sangareddy district administration has decided to establish border check-posts to check illegal transportation of sheep from the State to neighbouring Karnataka and Maharashtra.
The check-posts will be established at Narayanakhed, Nyalakal, Manoor, Zaheerabad, Nagalgidda and Kangti shortly. In a review meeting held here recently, Collector Manickaraj Kannan directed the officials to expedite work on the check-posts. The district transport officials were also involved in the process and directed to take action against the vehicles ferrying the sheep illegally.
According to sources, sheep is being diverted from the district to Mylaram and Umnabad in Bidar district of Karnataka where these are being sold to the beneficiaries from Adilabad, Nizamabad and Khammam districts. “Many of the residents in border areas have relatives on the other side of the State. The sheep are illegally being transported to that place and sold here. As the amount is being credited into the accounts of the locals there, the involvement of residents of Sangareddy district cannot be proved with documentary evidence,” said an official in the Animal Husbandry Department.
Responding to the reports published in a section of the press that sheep is being recycled, the Animal Husbandry Department directed its staff at field level to check whether all the units that were distributed to the beneficiaries are with them or have changed hands. An official admitted that at least two units were sold by a beneficiary in Mahabubnagar district when they were being brought from Kurnool in Andhra Pradesh.
“So far we have distributed sheep to as many as 2,250 beneficiaries out of our target of 15,551. The grounding of the scheme is on. Presently two teams each are in search of sheep at Anantapur and Kurnool followed by one team each at Guntur and Prakasam district,” Dr. Ramarao Rathod, Joint Director, Animal Husbandry, told The Hindu .
