New Delhi: Prime Minister Narendra Modi's event is responsible for eight cow deaths in Madhya Pradesh’s Rajgarh district, if reports put out by a couple of left-leaning media outlets are to be believed. An inquiry report by the district administration has, however, termed these allegations as “baseless” and “motivated”.

The media outlets reported that the cows died after 450 were “booted out” from a gaushala in Madhya Pradesh’s Pipliya Kulmi village on September 15 to make way for a huge television to host Prime Minister Modi’s interaction as part of his ‘Swachhta hi Seva’ (SHS) campaign.

The SHS campaign was launched on September 15 through a live interaction between Modi and groups and personalities closely associated with the Swachh Bharat movement who connected from across various locations.

One such location was the village in Rajgarh district where the interaction was scheduled with community members who have implemented the GOBARDhan initiative.

In response to allegations that eight cows died after 450 were moved to the local campus of the Mandi Parishad from the Naveen Gayatri Gaushala, the collector of Rajgarh instituted a six-member inquiry committee, which rubbished these allegations after a visit to the site.

Contrary to the impression that the cows were confined in a closed hall, the report said that it was a wide expanse of pasture which was regularly being used by villagers, as well as the gaushala, for cattle-grazing.

“The mandi at Pipaliya Kulmi village is an expanse of over six hectares of pasture land where green grass is available and has been used to graze cattle by the villagers. No retail activities of a mandi are carried out here,” the report said.

It further added, “As a matter of routine, all cows are left by the gaushala on this land to graze at 9am in the morning.”

The report also noted that the villagers, in order to save their crops from being devastated by cattle-grazing, had adopted the practice to graze their cattle on the mandi land at Pipaliya Kulmi.

“Therefore, to say that owing to the programme of the prime minister the cows were confined on the mandi land is not right,” the inquiry report said.

So far as the allegations of cows having died is concerned, the report rubbished it too after a close perusal of events. Moreover, there is no consensus about the number of cows that allegedly died. The news reports said eight, while the inquiry report said allegations were of six deaths.

In reality, the inquiry report said only two had died, and not owing to the event, but due to prior illness during treatment by a veterinary doctor. The cows had fallen ill on September 14, a day before the prime minister’s event and had died the subsequent morning.

“News of two ailing cows was received on September 14. Thereafter, Dr Jagdish Rathore of the veterinary department of Maachalpur treated them. They were given antibiotics and fluid therapy, but could not be saved. They died on the morning of September 15,” the report said.

The news that six cows had died due to the programme is “baseless”, the report concluded.