Drought is making life tough not only for the farmers of the Nilgiris district in Tamil Nadu but also for the cattle of the area in view of the fact that almost five cows are dying daily. Around 300 cattle have lost their lives in the villages of Balacola, Moyar and Masinagudi only and the deficiency of water and green fodder is responsible for it.
In the last six months, a farmer from Moyar, R Narayanan (45), has born the agony of losing 50 cows because of the drought and he is afraid of losing more as he says,
“Even today, nearly five cows have not returned after grazing. I will have to go to check tomorrow if they are alive.”
Narayanan also told that the district officials often don’t pay doctors for conducting the postmortems. In his words,
“So, doctors refuse to come and ask us to click pictures and cut open the cows on our own. We refused to do that and dumped the carcasses. These cows were not just our livelihood but a part of our lives as well. I spent nearly 8 lakhs in the last year to get fodder for my cows. Yet, I could not save them.”
This type of situation arose in the year 2000 as well when a good number of cattle died. Narayanan told,
“At that time, rains arrived and the deaths stopped after a few weeks. But this time, the cows continue to die.”
The environmentalists are of the opinion that drought has affected Salem, Coimbatore and Erode in the similar manner. The farmer from Masinagudi also shared the plight of his village,
“Last week nearly 20 cattle died in the village. The revenue officials are always informed about it but no steps are taken. They do not even conduct post-mortem.”
S Bharatidasan, who hails from Arulagam and is a member of an NGO, said that he has seen decomposed bodies of 59 cows in just 1 sq km on his way to a village in Nilgiris. He said,
“I was shocked to find 59 decomposed bodies of cows in just one sq km area. This is atrocious. If the same cows were killed by a tiger, it will be a national issue. Lack of fodder must have made them eat garbage.”
The garbage might have plastic bags and other stuff, which are not suitable for eating and are very harmful.
Cow vigilantes (gau rakshaks) have been very active for the last few months, beating and killing people who are seen with cattle on the doubt of smuggling but there has been no activity by them in such areas where they can save cows from dying. Where are they now?
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