Cattle to get Aadhaar like numbers in Andhra Pradesh from 1 June

The BJP coalition government in Andhra Pradesh will embark on a pilot project of issuing Aadhaar like unique numbers to cattle from Thursday. The process of linking the Aadhaar number of the farmer or the owner of the cattle at the local veterinary hospital in Amaravati in Guntur district of the state will be launched in the presence of state agriculture minister S.Chandramohan Reddy.

“The unique ID will help the farmer to take his cattle for treatment at the local veterinary hospital. The number will also help the authorities to track the movement of cattle too,” a senior officer in Agriculture Department said.  Andhra Pradesh which has a huge cattle population hopes to put a stop to illegal transportation of cattle particularly from drought-prone Rayalaseema region to mechanical slaughter houses in neighbouring Telangana state.

Jharkhand is another state in the country which has already started tagging cows with unique ID numbers. Each one of the bovines was tagged with its UID number that explains its sex age, breed and other details.

According to cattle census, the combined Andhra Pradesh had around 10.6 million cattle which have a considerable number of milch cattle like the Punganur breed and drought breed like Ongole. The state hopes to protect these rare breeds with the help of tagging them and maintaining a central data bank. As such cow slaughter is banned in Andhra Pradesh. The Andhra Pradesh Prohibition of Cow Slaughter and Animal Preservation Act, 1977 prohibits the slaughter of cows includes heifer, or a calf, whether male or female of a cow.

However, the slaughter of bulls and bullocks is allowed on obtaining a "fit-for-slaughter" certificate, only if the animal is not economical or not fit for breeding or draught agricultural operations. Anyone violating the law can be punished with imprisonment up to maximum of 6 months or fine of up to Rs 1,000 or both. The crime is treated as a cognizable offence.