Stray cattle menace grows, PSPCL sits on cess amount

Aman Sood

Tribune News Service

Patiala, September 18

The cattle menace is rising and the state is facing paucity of funds to tackle it, but the government departments collecting crores per annum as cow cess have failed to deposit the amount collected in the past over three years, despite repeated reminders.

Punjab State Power Corporation Limited (PSPCL) has collected over Rs 12 crore in the past three fiscals but managed to deposit less than 50 per cent of the amount.

According to a Right To Information (RTI) Act reply, the PSPCL has confirmed that they had collected over Rs 12.35 crore in the last three financial years but had deposited a mere Rs 5.58 crore with the corporations and committees concerned.

In 2016-17, against the Rs 2.50 crore collected, PSPCL released Rs 2.16 crore, which was the maximum in a fiscal. The next year, it collected Rs 2.81 crore but released only Rs 1.44 crore. In this fiscal, till August, PSPCL collected a whopping Rs 7.02 crore but released merely Rs 1.96 crore.

Meanwhile, Chief Minister Capt Amarinder Singh had recently formed a five-member Cabinet sub-committee to check the growing menace. He had also announced Rs 10 lakh to each deputy commissioner for opening an additional cow shelter in their respective districts to address the problem, according to an official statement.

“If the PSPCL releases the entire amount, the government will have sufficient funds to tackle the menace,” a senior officer said. There are currently 2.5 lakh head of stray cattle in the state, which claim over 100 lives per year.

Baldev Singh Sran, PSPCL CMD, told The Tribune that following court orders, a committee was formed to ascertain if the cess amount can be released for cow shelters or for non-productive stray cattle. “We will soon release the amount once a final decision is taken,” he said.