CHENNAI: Ten days after the Greater Chennai Corporation (GCC) mandated licensing and microchipping for all cattle, officials reported a tepid response from livestock owners.
With few coming forward voluntarily, the civic body now plans to visit cattle sheds directly to implant microchips and issue licenses.
A GCC official confirmed the shift in strategy: “Even launch of the initiative in January 31, cattle owners have not applied. We’ll now go to the sheds and microchip the cattle ourselves.”
The move follows a 2024 census that identified 22,875 cattle across the city.
Currently, GCC operates five cattle sheds in Tiruvottiyur, Manali, Madhavaram, Anna Nagar, and Teynampet, with plans to add 17 more within city limits. However, cattle owners argue this is insufficient.
Thanga Santhakumar, president, Kaalnadai Vivasayigal Munnetra Sangam, contested the official figures. “The 2024 count is outdated. The cattle population has likely risen to 30,000.
Seventeen new sheds cannot accommodate this number, and many families depend on these animals for their livelihood. Mandating licenses without first providing adequate shelter is highly condemnable,” he explained.
C Basker, a cattle owner from Moolakotham in Royapuram, added that owners remain uninformed. “No GCC official has properly communicated the new rules. We don’t understand the benefits or risks of microchipping,” he said.
Under the new regulations, all cattle owners must obtain a license to rear livestock legally. The process requires downloading an application from the GCC website and submitting the completed form to the respective zonal office (zones 1–15) by March 18. Following an inspection by zonal veterinary officers and health inspectors, licenses will be issued at a fee of Rs 100 per cow. Each animal will then be microchipped, and the owner’s name, address, and cattle details will be digitally recorded.
While the GCC frames the initiative as a step toward better urban livestock management and traceability, resistance from owners rooted in poor outreach and infrastructure gaps highlights the challenges of implementation.
Officials maintain that microchipping will streamline regulation, but owners insist that without adequate shelter space, the mandate remains impractical.