Daily Times

LAHORE: Lamenting over the government’s failure to take action against the milk mafia involved in the use of hormonal injections in dairy animals, the opposition on Friday submitted an adjournment motion and a calling attention notice in the Punjab Assembly.

Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) legislator Dr Murad Rass filed the adjournment motion while Pakistan Muslim League-Quaid (PML-Q) member Khadija Umar Farooqi submitted the calling attention notice in the Punjab Assembly Secretariat’s Notice Branch.

The movers showed serious concern over the open sale of recombinant bovine somatotropin (rBST) and bovine somatotropin (bST) injections, being used to get extra production of milk from cows and buffaloes. Both the movers said in their motion and notice that though the hormonal injections were totally banned across the world, they were being sold openly in the Pakistani markets, endangering the lives of not just animals but also humans.

They also said that as many as 937 animals (cows and buffaloes) had been killed and 2,318 infected owing to the use if the banned injections. They said that several diseases had also been transmitted to humans who used the “toxic milk” of those infected animals.

The PTI lawmaker also claimed in his motion that all the public institutes, including the livestock department and district governments, looked powerless before the milk mafia, and the officials concerned were just busy collecting ‘monthlies’ (bribes) from the culprits.

He requested the speaker to accommodate his appeal and hold a general debate in the House on the matter.

On the other hand, Khadija in her notice said that Justice Aysha A Malik of the Lahore High Court (LHC) had already imposed a ban on the sale of hormonal injections, they were openly being sold at different markets, including those in Shahpur Kanjra, Manawan, Bedian Road, Kahna, Begum Kot, Shahdara and Bund Road. She also demanded the government to present its report in the House regarding the implementation on the ban and action against violators.

According to veterinary expert Dr Kamran Abid, a hormonal injection by the name of “Boostin” (containing bST protein hormone) had been banned in the international market as well as in Pakistan, but some other injections that could be used for the same purpose were being sold in Pakistani markets. About the harmful effects of these injections, he told Daily Times that though the dairy farmers succeed in getting 50 percent extra milk by injecting such hormones in cows or buffaloes, the health of the cattle is put at risk and they usually die within three years.