The Gazetteers Department

Live-stock still plays a pivotal role in the agricultural economy of the district and also constitutes one of the valuable possessions of the farmer. Most of the agricultural operations such as ploughing, harrowing, hoeing, irrigation, transport, etc., are carried out with the help of draught animals. Cows and she-buffaloes are a source of milk. Besides, the live-stock provides much of the organic manure used on the farms. Realising the importance of live-stock in the agrarian economy of the district as elsewhere in the State, the Animal Husbandry Department of Maharashtra State has been closely associating itself with the programme of improving the cattle-wealth in the district. The department has undertaken various schemes for providing veterinary aid to farmers in the district. The table No. 17 gives taluka-wise total live-stock population in the district as per 1972 live-stock census.

TABLE No. 17—LIVE-STOCK IN EACH TALUKA OF AHMADNAGAR
DISTRICT AS PER 1972 CENSUS

Cattle
Taluka	Males over 3 years					Females over 3 years
	used for breeding only	used for breeding and work	used for work only	Others	Total males	In milk	Breeding
	used for breeding only	used for breeding and work	used for work only	Others	Total males	In milk	Dry and not calved once
District Total	496	14,440	3,34,236	3,422	3,52,594	86,169	1,70,354
Kopargaon	84	2,302	27,538	282	30,206	8,169	3,199
Akola	93	1,923	27,965	398	30,379	8,890	24,387
Sangamner	17	141	32,695	132	32,985	6,103	19,397
Shrirampur	20	904	16,771	269	17,964	7,792	9,624
Rahuri	21	137	18,019	385	18,562	6,120	8,796
Nevasa	15	16	25,455	27	25,513	6,092	7,323
Shevgaon	38	352	28,726	60	29,176	6,089	8,780
Parner	34	574	35,831	472	36,911	6,776	24,436
Ahmadnagar	28	513	28,520	85	29,146	8,286	12,263
Pathardi	24	770	24,852	401	26,047	4,470	9,650
Shrigonda	103	3,055	25,400	465	29,023	6,655	12,423
Karjat	17	830	26,183	263	27,293	6,077	12,632
Jamkhed	2	2,923	16,281	183	19,389	4,750	7,444

continued..

Cattle					Buffaloes
years			Young stock	Total cattle	Buffaloes
Working	Others	Total females	Young stock	Total cattle	used for breeding only	used for breeding and work	used for work only
2,182	1,906	2,60,611	2,82,558	8,15,763	439	341	2,796
--	234	21,602	18,884	70,692	44	20	99
239	42	33,558	19,517	83,454	7	54	2,077
3	30	25,533	17,835	76,353	20	2	15
11	140	17,567	15,938	51,469	29	54	64
10	64	14,984	11,903	45,449	4	7	40
17	1	13,433	12,875	51,821	20	8	28
148	46	15,063	11,170	55,409	47	30	58
2	581	31,795	22,169	90,865	11	10	25
23	14	20,586	18,421	68,153	63	37	58
248	228	14,596	10,569	51,212	47	35	103
627	344	19,949	18,081	67,053	42	16	37
--	119	18,828	15,551	61,672	13	31	128
860	63	13,117	8,645	42,151	92	37	64

TABLE No.17—contd.

Taluka	Buffaloes
Taluka	Others	Total males	In-milk	Dry and not calved once	working	Others	Young stock
District	163	3,739	23,112	29,906	684	302	30,536
Kopargaon	46	209	2,159	4,019	56	32	2,927
Akola	28	2,166	2,372	4,858	134	72	3,934
Sangamner	--	37	1,266	1,720	--	3	2,051
Shrirampur	10	157	2,034	2,462	30	10	2,268
Rahuri	--	51	2,223	1,943	2	1	2,100
Nevasa	--	56	967	1,257	4	1	1,412
Shevgaon	17	152	980	1,544	15	18	1,741
Parner	1	47	1,376	2,419	24	13	2,703
Ahmadnagar	1	159	5,186	3,796	51	2	4,384
Pathardi	13	198	1,244	1,824	100	66	2,221
Shrigonda	5	100	1,323	1,353	180	57	1,642
Karjat	14	186	871	1,154	8	10	1,404
Jamkhed	28	221	1,111	1,557	80	17	1,749

continued..

Total buffaloes	Total bovine	Sheep	Goats	Other live-stock	Total live-stock	Total poultry
88,279	9,04,042	2,98,593	5,46,705	22,837	17,72,177	7,73,317
9,402	80,094	6,882	46,719	2,264	1,35,959	34,457
13,536	96,990	3,668	32,151	930	1,33,739	55,503
5,077	81,430	60,097	67,166	1,075	2,10,218	85,832
6,961	58,430	5,156	35,637	2,498	1,01,721	65,782
6,320	51,769	13,709	40,473	4,597	1,10,548	51,231
3,697	55,518	8,257	40,947	1,438	1,06,160	40,903
4,450	59,859	4,313	35,853	1,195	1,01,220	28,913
6,582	97,457	95,914	56,985	2,268	2,52,624	1,03,980
13,578	81,731	12,549	52,962	1,508	1,48,750	88,463
5,653	56,865	14,957	36,707	687	1,09,216	43,072
4,655	71,708	25,657	40,728	1,222	1,39,315	75,123
3,633	65,305	40,350	36,347	1,647	1,43,649	72,247
4,735	46,886	7,084	23,580	1,508	1,79,058	27,811

In Ahmadnagar district there are 10 veterinary hospitals, three veterinary dispensaries, 43 veterinary aid centres, and two branch veterinary dispensaries. The qualified veterinary staff at these centres looks after the sick animals, castrate the scrub bulls and carry out preventive vaccination against the contagious diseases. Besides, they implement various animal husbandry schemes for improving the livestock. All the above-mentioned institutes are now under the jurisdiction of the Zilla Parishad, Ahmadnagar. The following statement gives number of cases treated and castrations and vaccinations carried out during the period from 1965-66 to 1968-69 and 1972-73.

Year	Cases treated	Castrations	Vaccinations
1965-66	1,15,911	29,964	2,14,557
1966-67	1,27,931	33,800	6,19,388
1967-68	1,89,398	20,200	3,07,998
1968-69	1,16,652	22,341	3,51,120
1972-73	1,33,119	6,771	N.A.

N. A. =Not available

Following is the description of various animal husbandry schemes undertaken in the district: —

Cattle-breeding Farm: A cattle-breeding farm is established at Kopargaon under the State sector where animals of gir breed are made available. Gir cows are famous for their high milk-yield.

Key Village Scheme: Two key village centres have been established in the district, one at Kopargaon and the other at Sangamner, each having six key village units. This scheme is in operation all over the country and aims at the over-all improvement of all classes of animals. The Scheme envisages treatment of animals, castrations, improvement of fodder and development of marketing facilities. The technique of artificial insemination is also made use of.

Premium Bull Scheme: A district premium bull scheme is in operation under which 128 bulls have been provided. The object of the scheme is to encourage the people to improve their cattle by taking the services of the premium bulls. Some maintenance charges and subsidies towards the actual cost of the bull are given to the farmers to whom the premium bulls are supplied.

Supplementary Cattle-breeding Centres : Four supplementary cattle-breeding centres have been established in the district and 16 breeding bulls of dangi and khillar breed and 167 cows of breedable age are provided therein.

Artificial Insemination: Artificial insemination is a new technique for improving the quality of the live-stock. One artificial insemination centre with 16 such sub-centres have been established in the district.

Mutton Production Scheme: Mutton production scheme and crash programme scheme have been introduced in the district. The former was started in 1963 under which three centres have been established and 29 rams and 279 ewes have been supplied. About thirty persons took the advantage of this scheme. The crash programme was introduced in the district in 1965 under which forty rams and 500 ewes were supplied to five centres. Under this scheme a total of fifty persons were benefited.

Poultry Development: Intensive poultry development block was established at Ahmadnagar in November 1966. Under this scheme various facilities such as free technical guidance and advice, vaccinations, short training course of a duration of 15 days in poultry husbandry, loans in kind, supply of improved birds and feed, marketing of produce, etc., have been given to the poultry-keepers. Loans amounting to Rs. 22,000 have been advanced in kind to the deserving farmers for poultry-keeping. The following statement gives information regarding the work done in the district under the poultry development programme during the period between 1966-67 and 1969-70: —

Item of work	Year
Item of work	1966-67	1967-68	1968-69	1969-70
Loans advanced in kind (cost in rupees)	3,000	16,000	3,000	--
Vaccinations carried out	--	22,339	25,991	12,901
Hatching eggs sold	--	1,672	--	About 2,947 D. O. briolers were raised upto 9 weeks and disposed off to the Poultry Dressing Plant, Pune.
Birds sold for breeding	--	18	--
Eggs sold for table purposes	--	38,847	--
Farmers trained in poultry-keeping	72	140	101	440

To provide better marketing facilities to the poultry-keepers, the eggs collection and marketing scheme has been introduced in the district. This scheme is popular amongst the cultivators as it provides more marginal profits to them.

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