Porbandar: Finally Porbandar is going to have cow sanctuary. Ground breaking for cow sanctuary was performed today morning by Porbandar MLA and cabinet minister Babubhai Bokhiria. This is going to be the first cow sanctuary in India.

The place chosen for this initiative is Dharampur area in Porbandar district. The sanctuary will come up over 2100 vigha (around 358 hectare) land.

Central government has approved cow sanctuaries in Rajasthan and Porbandar.

Likely cost of Porbandar cow sanctuary is Rs 43 crore. Rs 11 crore amount has been allocated for this project in this financial year, of which Rs 5 crore is already released.

The project will in its initial face see construction of cattle shade, fodder godown, building water storage tanks, bore-well, pump house, staff quarters etc facilities.

The main reason for selection of this particular area for cow sanctuary is availability of ample land in size of 600 acre. The land has been handed over to animal husbandry department by district collector.

Cow sanctuary will be managed by Junagadh Agriculture University. It is learnt that in the first phase, 150 Gir cows will be brought to cow sanctuary. Ultimately as many as 2,000 Gir cows will be living at this place. In later stage veterinary college will also be started here. The students who presently study veterinary in Junagadh Agriculture University will have to come here for post graduation course.

DeshGujarat