Rescued from smugglers, over 250 cows stolen from Tripura’s cow shelter in 6 months

Officials of the Delhi-based Dhyan Foundation that looks after the cow shelter in Debipur village, 22km from state capital Agartala, lodged a complaint of the theft at the Madhupur police station. The cow shelter has 596 cows at present.

More than 250 cows, which were among those rescued by the Border Security Force (BSF) from being smuggled to Bangladesh earlier, have been stolen from a cow shelter in Tripura’s Sepahijala district in the last six months.

More than 250 cows, which were among those rescued by the Border Security Force (BSF) from being smuggled to Bangladesh earlier, have been stolen from a cow shelter in Tripura’s Sepahijala district in the last six months.(Virendra Singh Gosain/HT PHOTO)

Officials of the Delhi-based Dhyan Foundation that looks after the cow shelter in Debipur village, 22km from state capital Agartala, lodged a complaint of the theft at the Madhupur police station. The cow shelter has 596 cows at present.

“According to our reports, more than 250 cows were stolen from our shelter. We have lodged complaints regarding this five-six times in the police station,” a volunteer of the non-government organisation, R Lata Devi, said.

“On October 24, few people came with arms in the shelter and tried to steal at least 12 cows, but they left the place without the cows after we reached there,” Devi said.

The NGO had said earlier that 159 cows had died in the shelter between May and July this year. Of them, 45 died due to ‘hypothermia’ in the second week of July as they were out in the open due to the lack of sufficient sheds. It had rained heavily and they suffered a cold shock, it had said.

The cow shelter has 18 workers along with one supervisor who work during the day. But at night, only two workers and the supervisor stay in the shelter, said Devi.

“The workers refused to stay at night following frequent interrogation by the police since we have lodged a complaint of cow theft. We have installed four CCTV cameras in the entire cow shelter,” she said.

Madhupur Police confirmed the complaints of cow theft.

Officer-in-charge of Madhupur police station Bishnupada Bhowmik said they have rescued a few cows and handed them over to the NGO.

“Attempts are on to rescue the stolen cows. We have asked the NGO about the detailed report regarding the cows in the shelter,” Bhowmick said.

The foundation started the shelter in February on four acres of land allotted by the state government and provides medicine and other support to the rescued cattle.