Beef politics a trigger for deep discord

It is unfortunate that inept handling by Central and/or State governments often leads to sensitive and emotive issues coming to the fore, disturbing communal peace and harmony. There is a tendency for vested interests to exploit such sensitive issues to create divisions in society. The media, out of its sensationalist predilection, tends to blow up things out of proportion. The latest case in point is the ban on the slaughter of cattle, be they cows or buffaloes. Restrictions placed by the new rules of the Union Environment Ministry on the sale of cattle in a livestock market for purposes of slaughter and religious animal sacrifices have been the immediate trigger for a new controversy. Prevention of Cruelty to Animals (Regulation of Livestock Markets) Rules of 2017 permit the sale of cattle in markets only to verified “agriculturists”, who have to give an undertaking to authorities that cattle will not be sold or slaughtered for meat. Nor shall the animal be used for sacrifices. The animal will be used only for farming. The rules take away the rights of the owner to even sell the carcass of an animal dying of “natural causes” in the market. The rules prescribe that the carcass will be incinerated and not be sold or flayed for leather.

Taking a dig at the BJP-ruled Centre and the RSS, Kerala Chief Minister Pinarayi Vijayan said recently that he didn’t need a “lesson in food habits from New Delhi or Nagpur (the RSS headquarters).” “The state government will give all facilities to people to have food of their choice.” In a spirit of defiance that was ominous, he added: “There is no need for Keralites to learn it from anybody in New Delhi or Nagpur.” He said meat was the primary source of protein for millions of the poor and ordinary people in the country, particularly Dalits. Such restrictions being imposed on the eve of Ramzan, would certainly appear to certain communities in the country as a “direct attack on them”, Vijayan said. The Chief Minister shot off a letter to Prime Minister Narendra Modi, saying the ban amounted to an “intrusion” into the rights of the states.

Indeed, Vijayan’s public statement on the slaughter issue came essentially in the wake of a political slugfest over the alleged slaughter of an ox by Youth Congress member Rijil Makulti and his accomplices. The Youth Congress activists were booked for the alleged ox slaughter in Kannur, Kerala. The offence deals with slaughtering any animal in a way that causes annoyance or inconvenience to the public and is punishable with imprisonment up to one year or a fine of up to Rs 5,000 or both. Conscious of the fact that an anti-Hindu tag had worked in alienating the Congress party from the majority community in elections in recent years Congress vice-president Rahul Gandhi was quick to suspended members of its youth wing who had participated in the ‘beef fest’ organised in Kerala to protest against the Centre's ban on sale of cattle for slaughter at animal markets.

The Kerala government is said to be mulling a new law to counter the central ban on sale of cattle for slaughter as the political slugfest over the issue intensified, fuelled by the row over alleged ox slaughter by Youth Congress activists. Evidently, the slaughter issue has assumed new overtones with even the Northeast being unhappy over the BJP’s activism on it. Data from the latest National Sample Survey Office (NSSO) shows that around 80 million people — 1 in every 13 Indians — eat beef or buffalo meat. Of them, the Northeastern states form a dominant chunk — Assam, Meghalaya, Mizoram, Nagaland, hill areas of Manipur and the tribal belt of Tripura have high consumption levels. While the senior BJP leadership has been assuring the northeast that it will not be covered by the ban on cow slaughter, any tinkering by over-zealous activists could disturb the applecart and incite public sentiment. As the issue seems to be snowballing across the country, a section of students from Bombay IIT recently held a beef fest out in the open lawns of the institution to defy the Sangh Parivar activists.

While the Youth Congress activists who slaughtered an ox in Kannur were playing with religious sentiments of the majority community and at the same time defying a law in full public display in an act of gory torture of the animal and must be brought to book, it is equally true that the BJP and its outfits have been imposing their will on others in a state where beef eating is widespread and is not frowned upon. The Centre and the states have a lot to work on in the interest of the country and must eschew emotive issues that lead to a confrontation. If the country is to progress without hindrance, the states must be left free on most issues while the Centre concerns itself with issues that unite rather than disunite.

THE Centre and the states have a lot to work on in the interest of the country and must eschew emotive issues that lead to a confrontation