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Vets on poll duty; livestock left to die
Aditi Tandon
Tribune News Service

Chandigarh, January 21
Punjab’s livestock has been left to die. With veterinary officers and pharmacists being pulled out of hospitals for election duty, the livestock stands exposed to an epidemic outbreak.

More and more cases of mortality are surfacing in districts, as the livestock succumb to winter diseases like milk fever, haemorragic septicemia and dystokia (a delivery related emergency). Also, there are hardly any vets available to administer crucial vaccines like the anti-foot and mouth disease (FMD) vaccine for which Punjab is getting aid worth crores from the Government of India.

This is happening in gross violation of rules and guidelines laid down by the Election Commission of India. None on emergency service can be put on election duty. Veterinary services, like medical services, fall under emergency services.

But Deputy Commissioners — especially of Amritsar, Taran Taran, Gurdaspur and Ludhiana - seem to be oblivious of the fact. They have posted veterinary doctors and para veterinarians on election duty and while farmers are crying hoarse with their cattle dying unattended in hospitals or following wrong treatment by quacks, veterinary doctors are conducting door-to-door verification of voters’ list, rectifying voters’ lists and deleting names from these lists.

And this has happened despite the Punjab Animal Husbandry Department communicating to DCs that vets cannot be put on election duty. Dr B.S. Sidhu, Director of the department, told The Tribune: “We have earned special exemption from election duty. Just before the 2002 Assembly elections, our Secretary apprised the Election Commission of India of the problem we were facing.

“The ECI sent us the exemption order which we handed down to DCs, who head the respective government bodies in districts. But we are disturbed to find that the DCs of Amritsar, Taran Taran, Ludhiana and Gurdaspur have put vets on election duty, while our livestock and breeding programmes are suffering .

To make matters worse, the DCs have also put Class IV employees on poll duty, ensuring that hospitals are empty.

As for the vets, they cannot do much. DCs write the ACRs of district chiefs who naturally have to oblige their bosses, never mind the violation of ECI rules.