This group of friends buys fodder for stray cattle

Ludhiana: While most city residents are busy complaining how the lockdown is forcing more stray cattle into residential; areas in search of food, this group of friends is pitching in to buy green fodder to feed stray cows and bulls roaming on the city roads.

The friends, under the banner Jai Maa Bhramari Devi Sewa Samiti, organise langar in Banbhori Dham, Hisar district in Haryana every year. But this year, due to the curfew, they could not visit Banbhori Dham. So, they decided to serve stray cattle here. The members of the samiti will continue to feed until the curfew is in place.

Dharmendra Sharma, chairman of Jai Maa Bhramari Devi Sewa Samiti said, “We collect money and every month, we facilitate pilgrimage to pay obeisance to Goddess Bhramari Devi in Hisar. We organise a bus the pilgrims and take care of them during the trip. All the expenses are borne by us. And every year, we also organise a langar at the temple.” He said due to curfew, they could not visit the temple this year, but they had already collected around Rs 3.5 lakh for langar. They decided to serve the stray cattle with that money.

Sharma said it took almost a week to get permissions from authorities, as they were nudged towards feeding human beings. “But we were adamant that we would feed cattle, said Sharma and claimed that since March 31 they are doing this service.

Anil Garg, president of the samiti, said, “We carry fodder for at least 400 to 500 cattle in a trolley and start from Gobindgarh crossing and cover areas like Tajpur Road, Dhandhari, Durga Colony, Sherpur, Railway colony and Kailash Nagar etc.” He said many organisations are doing their bit for providing food to the poor people who cannot earn money during the lockdown, but hardly anybody is thinking about the helpless animals.

Jai Bhagwan Goel, general secretary, said, “Bhramari Devi is kuldevi for Aggarwal community.We are 10 friends and collect Rs 11,000 each and arrange money from some other members for organising langar. But now when we could not spend money in our regular activity, so we decided to spend it stray cattle.” He said stray cattle are suffering, as people are not going out to feed them leftover chapatis and such.

Sanjeev Garg, who is also a general secretary, said, “Initially, for two three days we also served cooked food to poor, but they were hoarding so we decided to do something else. Then we decided to feed the stray cattle as nobody is doing anything for these homeless creatures.”