Top court stays govt ban on cattle sale for slaughter

NEWDELHI: The Supreme Court on Tuesday extended to all of India the Madras high court order that put on hold the Centre’s notification banning sale and purchase of cattle from animal markets for slaughter, a move that had triggered howls of protest.

The Centre told the court the cattle-trade rules, which several states refused to implement, would not come into effect due to the HC order. Objections to the present rules are under consideration and the ministry of environment and forest would revise them by August-end, additional solicitor general P Narasimha told a bench, led by Chief Justice JS Khehar, which disposed petitions challenging the controversial notification.

The Modi government on May 25 banned sale of cattle, including cows, for slaughter and restricted cattle trade to farm owners, a decision that hit poor farmers and squeezed supplies to the country’s ~1 lakh-crore meat industry. Five days later, the HC suspended the order.

“Certain aspects of the rules are troubling some stakeholders. The secretary, MoEF, is looking into it and a new regime that will serve the interest of all will be in place after detailed deliberations,” Narasimha said, urging the bench not to stay the rules.

He said the government had not even appealed against the HC order. Narasimha attempted to dispel apprehensions that action would be taken as per the existing rules.

But, the court, which at the outset asked Narasimha to put the rules in abeyance, extended the HC’s stay order to the entire country. It gave liberty to the petitioners to approach the court again if they were aggrieved with the new rules.

The direction came after the petitioner’s counsel, senior advocate Kapil Sibal, complained that despite the interim order, authorities were issuing notices to traders. “The rules obligate the states to identify the markets. People are afraid of selling animals or carry out any trade,” Sibal submitted briefly.

Rivals have accused the government of pushing a beef ban through the back door in keeping with the BJP’s Hindutva agenda.

The court told the petitioners that they were free to come back to it if they find the new rules wanting. The ban has hurt mostly Muslim meat and leather traders who face mounting violence by cow vigilante groups. Farmers have also been deprived of a traditional source of income from selling non-milch and ageing cattle.

THE SUPREME COURT GAVE LIBERTY TO THE PETITIONERS TO APPROACH IT AGAIN IF THEY WERE AGGRIEVED WITH THE NEW RULES