Move to introduce licensing system for cattle rearing within city limits put off

Tiruchi Corporation Council on Wednesday deferred a move to introduce a licensing system for rearing cattle and other domestic animals within the city limits. With this, the council has effectively stalled, at least temporarily, the implementation of the by-laws for introducing the licence system approved by it in November. The council had then approved the rate of licence fee for rearing animals and penalties on owners of animals raising them unauthorised. The by-laws was framed in the wake of repeated complaints from city residents and elected representatives of the corporation over the stray cattle and pig menace in the city.

The by-laws also sought to impose a ban on rearing animals in places along national highways, State highways, corporation thoroughfares, roads where schools and colleges are situated, and commercial and market areas that have been classified as zone A, B and C in the city.

The proposed annual licence fee was Rs.1,000 per head for horses, Rs.500 for cows and donkeys, Rs.300 for pigs, and Rs.200 for goats. Penalties for violations were also fixed.

The by-laws was proposed to be gazetted, after calling for objections if any, and enforced from April 1, 2013.

The subject came up before the council again at an ordinary meeting chaired by A.Jaya, Mayor, on Wednesday through an official resolution seeking its nod for the collection of the licence fee from April 1 as no objection was received 30 days after the by-laws was publicly notified.

However, J.Srinivasan of the AIADMK suggested a decision on the subject be deferred and the resolution be cancelled as the areas where cattle rearing is to be banned has not been clearly specified. Besides, the licence fee and penalties proposed was too high in certain cases, he contended. His request was acceded to without any discussion. Similarly, the council stalled the move to hike the service charge for hotels, tea shops, eateries and marriage halls for clearing garbage from their premises.

The council in October last year had cleared hiking the service charges with effect from January 1 this year in view of the increase in the salary of sanitary workers, diesel price and other operational costs involved in clearing solid wastes from the establishments.

The subject came up before the council on Wednesday seeking its nod for gazetting the revised fee structure as no objection was received after its public notification.

But the council deferred a decision on this subject too based on requests from Mr.Srinivasan and a few other AIADMK councillors to cancel the resolution. DMK councillors, having staged a walk-out earlier, were not present when the subjects were taken up by the council.