Poor arrangement mars Jhajjar cattle fair

Ravinder Saini

Tribune News Service

Jhajjar, October 28

A five-year-old Murrah bull died due to alleged negligence in providing medical aid to animals during the ongoing state-level cattle fair here yesterday.

Raj Narayan, a resident of Puthi village, Hisar, has blamed veterinary doctors on duty for his bull’s death and demanded adequate compensation. He said a cattle rearer recently made a bid of Rs 15 lakh to buy the bull, but he did not sell it.

“Yesterday, we observed that it was not fit and managed to contact a veterinary doctor on duty after a struggle of two hours. No medicine was available at the fair and we had to purchase medicines from outside twice,” said Raj.

He said they urged the doctor to refer the bull to Hisar, but he refused, stating it would be well soon, but its condition deteriorated. “No doctor was available with the ambulance. The bull died due to medical negligence. Substandard fodder must be the reason for his condition,” he alleged.

Raj Narayan said Animal Husbandry Minister OP Dhankar did not give them any satisfactory response when they apprised him of the loss and urged him for help.

Several others cattle rearers, including Ajit Singh from Rohtak, Harbhajan from Kaithal, Kapoor Singh, Narender and Manoj from Hisar and Ram Singh from Rohtak, also decried the organisers for poor arrangement.

They alleged that smelly, dusty and stale fodder was being given to the cattle, affecting their health. Most of the cattle rearers spent a sleepless night as no arrangement was made for their accommodation. They were served substandard food and no mobile toilets were available, they alleged.

Sukhdev Rathi, nodal officer at the fair, rubbished the allegations of negligence and claimed the bull was extended every possible treatment. The exact cause of the death would be ascertained after the post-mortem report, he said.

“Four doctors have been deployed at the fair to provide round-the-clock medical aid to the cattle,” said Rathi, claiming that proper arrangements had been made for cattle rearers and their animals.

Meanwhile, Speaker Kanwar Pal Gujjar inaugurated a ramp show organised at the fair.