Investigate Cattle Smuggling: All India Livestock Traders’ and Transporters’ Association

STAFF REPORTER

GUWAHATI: The All India Livestock Traders’ and Transporters’ Association (AILTTA) has said that Chief Minister Sarbananda Sonowal is being made the scapegoat through increased smuggling of cattle through Assam. The Association raised the demand investigation into cattle smuggling.

Allegations of increased cattle smuggling have been doing rounds for quite some time now. Worried about the development, the All India Livestock Traders’ and Transporters’ Association organized a press meet on Monday.

General Secretary of the association Munna Saikia said: “The livestock syndicate is operating unchecked. The entire cattle smuggling fiasco is running rampant in the state due to the negligence and the casual attitude of the monitoring officials on the National Highways reclining in the outposts and police stations in inter-state border areas.”

Saikia further contended that cattle smuggling trade is operated by traders who are not native to the state. “Cattle are basically transported from Uttar Pardesh, Hariyana, Bihar and Gujarat through the West Bengal transit point. The cattle are illegally smuggled into the state through Boxirhat in Dhubri and Sreerampur gates. As per guidelines, both Veterinary Officers (VO) and Motor Vehicle Inspectors (MVI) should be present in the entry gates which should be checked by those manning them.

No cattle carrying vehicle should be allowed to enter without a cattle movement pass from the VO. However, the gates have no VO deployed there, and as such checking is completely skipped. The entire process of illegal cattle smuggling stems from this. From Dhubri or through the 9 Mile route in Meghalaya, it is transported to Bangladesh. The traders who run this business have made Assam their home address to evade arrest,” Saikia said. Demanding a proper investigation and probe into the matter of illegal cattle transportation, the association demanded proper punishment to be meted out against the entire syndicate.

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