Bilaspur
On Monday, the High Court heard the ongoing public interest litigation in Chhattisgarh to free the roads including national and state highways from stray cattle. The division bench of Chief Justice Ramesh Kumar Sinha and Justice Ravindra Kumar Aggarwal sought information from the government about compliance with its earlier orders.
Additional Advocate General Yashwant Singh Thakur appeared in the court on behalf of the government. He said that the draft of SOP to deal with the problem of cattle has not been finalized yet. 15 days time is required to complete it.
Accepting the government’s request, the High Court has fixed the next hearing of the case on February 10. In compliance with the order given on October 23, 2024, the court had directed the Chief Secretary to submit a fresh affidavit on the steps taken to stop the problem of cattle on highways and roads.
In this, the report of the divisional survey conducted by the divisional commissioners of Raipur, Bilaspur, Durg, Bastar and Surguja was also presented.
During this time, the High Court also clarified that the report of the committee constituted to examine the mechanisms adopted by other states and their effectiveness has not yet been presented. The court directed to submit reply on this also.
Directing the government and other departments to stop the problem of stray cattle and preparing an effective action plan, the court has ordered to keep an eye on the matter.
Major points included in the survey report
Government agencies along with gram panchayats and municipal bodies organized meetings of animal owners to solve the problem of stray animals in all the districts of the state.
Resting places for stray animals were identified along the roads and the process of cleaning and leveling them was carried out.
The number of all these meetings and marked locations has been included in the detailed survey report.
