Image: Reuters

Rajasthan’s vanishing cattle bazaars
As per the 19th Livestock census 2012, there are 577.32 lakhs Livestock (which include Cattle, buffalo, Sheep, Goat, Horse & Ponies, Mules, Donkeys, Camel, Pig) and 80.24 lakhs Poultry. Dairy cows, bullocks, buffaloes and camels are the most commonly traded animals, though horses and sheep are also traded. Popular govansh (an umbrella term that covers cows, oxen, bullocks and sundry bovines) breeds traded in Rajasthan include Rathi, Kankrej, Nagour, Tharparkar, Sanchori and Mehwati. Murrah is the only buffalo breed traded in the state.

There are 9 major cattle fairs organised across Rajasthan in accordance with State Livestock Fair Act 1963. Apart from Bharatpur and Ajmer, perhaps the most popular animal market the annual Pushkar Fair, that is internationally renowned for its camel market. However, Pushkar is also a marketplace where cows, oxen and bulls are bought and sold. According to the Lokhit Pashu Palan Sansthan, 17,604 animals were sold at the Pushkar fair in 2011 that included 8238 camels, 4403 horses and 4256 cattle. But the number of cattle sold dropped to a measly 8 in 2017!

As per data compiled by Rajasthan’s Department of Animal Husbandry, there has been a drop of over 90 per cent in cattle sales between 2012-13 and 2016-17 across Rajasthan’s nine state-level livestock fairs. In 2012-13, while 54,423 cattle were brought to the nine state-level fairs, 37,249 of these were sold. In 2016-17, this figure had dropped significantly. Only 10,827 were offered for sale and only 2,973 were bought. As per the same data, cumulative earnings by cattle owners at fairs, which stood at Rs 92.18 crore in 2012-13, dropped to Rs 39.42 crore in 2016-17. Meanwhile, the revenues for the Animal Husbandry Department have also taken a beating. The Department that earns revenue through sales of receipts, made a meagre Rs 1.88 lakhs in 2016-17 as opposed to Rs 7 lakh in 2012-13.

Cow Vigilantism leading to Stray Cattle Menace
Rajasthan has witnessed a series of well documented instances of cow vigilantism and lynching such as Pehlu Khan, Umar Mohammed and most recently Rakhbar alias Akbar Khan. This is why few dairy farmers go cattle shopping in the state. In fact, cow vigilantes have reportedly turned this fear into an extortion racket, where dairy farmers who are taking their newly bought cattle back home are routinely waylaid or lynched unless they cough up a hefty amount to ensure safe travel.

Meanwhile, the inability to get rid of aging and unproductive bovines has meant that many cattle are abandoned by farmers. These stray cattle wreak havoc on standing crops and add to farmer’s woes. According to the State government, over 80 per cent of rural families keep livestock in Rajasthan. This is by no means an insignificant vote bank.

So the big question is, if electoral fortunes depend on the blessings of the holy cow, which political party will milk the benefits this election season.

The post Who will Gau Mata bless in the Rajasthan Elections? appeared first on SabrangIndia.

 
New Delhi: In May 2017, the Centre prohibited sale of cattle for slaughter, including buffaloes, at livestock markets across the country. The prohibition was a part of the ‘Regulation of Livestock Markets Rules,’ 2017, that were notified by the environment ministry. The Rules were formulated on orders of the Supreme Court, primarily to prevent illegal cattle trade and to regulate livestock markets.
 
Due to severe backlash on how the regulation was unconstitutional and violated federal fundamental laws like right to livelihood, right to eat and other civil liberties, the regulation was modified and deleted the word slaughter from the regulations for Animal cruelty. The modification was complete by October 2017.
 
“The Prevention of Cruelty to Animals (Regulation of Livestock Market) Rules, notified on May 23, 2017 banned sale of cattle for slaughter in animal markets, it was later withdrawn in October 2017, and subsequently revised, after a discussion headed by a Group of Ministers headed by Union Minister Nitin Gadkari,” reported Indian Express.
 
An RTI query filed by The Indian Express with the MoEF revealed that the Animal Welfare Board of India (AWBI) was questioned as early as June of 2016 over its jurisdiction to draw up federal guidelines to regulate animal markets.
 
The report said, “… the said Rules are within the purview of State List. Further, since each State is competent to formulate rules and regulations as per their requirement for cattle, is Central Government competent to make Rules under State List?” noted a letter written to then chairman of the AWBI by joint secretary Anil Sant at MoEF’s Animal Welfare Division.
 
“The Rules were framed following a writ petition filed in 2014, where the Supreme Court passed an order on July 13, 2015 to frame guidelines to prevent animals from being smuggled out of India for the Gandhimai Festival held in Nepal. The SC also directed that rules with regard to Livestock Market be notified. On July 12, 2016 the Supreme Court directed the Ministry to frame rules under Section 38 of the PCA Act, 1960,” reported The Indian Express.
 
Many state leaders had warned the centre that the new regulation would create tension in minorities and lead to violence. The rise of cow vigilantism, mob lynchings and attacks on people involved in the dairy farming, leather and slaughter industry, who are primarily Muslims and Dalits, has only increased in the last four years.
 
It is anybody’s guess why the centre allowed the law to be framed in the first place. It was in BJPs manifesto in 2014 general elections, to protect cows. Clubbing the slaughter industry with the Animal Cruelty Laws was a masterstroke to justify and pacify Modi’s cow-belt voters’ propaganda.

“The livestock economy is a significant contributor to farmer incomes and if the proposed rules are not modified they will lead to a collapse of the dairy trade besides hurting buffalo meat exports,” said Fauzan Alavi, spokesperson of the All India Meat and Livestock Exporters Association in a report by Livemint.
 
“Buffalo meat is among India’s largest export commodities but the trade is being impacted due to restrictions on the movement of animals,” Alavi said, adding, “If the government is serious about improving farm incomes it should actually incentivise the dairy and meat industry… However, we have been repeatedly kept out of government consultations,” the report said.
 
State CMs had issued warnings
After the final notification had been sent out in May 2017, the Prime Minister’s Office received nine representations from different Indian states, concerned about the law and order situation that will arise out of this regulation. “One each from Chief Ministers of Kerala, Karnataka, and Puducherry, one each from then Governors of Kerala and Meghalaya, one from Kerala Assembly leader of opposition from the Congress party and three Members of Parliament from Revolutionary Socialist Party, Indian National Congress and National People’s Party sent their representation,” reported The Indian Express.
 
Both Kerala CM Pinarayi Vijayan and then Karnataka CM Siddaramaiah wrote a year later that states should have been consulted while framing the rules.
 
“Information with MoEF reveals that the controversial Rules were framed under sub-section (2)(1) of Section 38 of the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals Act, 1960. However, Siddaramaiah in his letter noted that the Rules were violative of PCA Act, 1960,” the report said.
 
A letter by Karnataka government in August last year said that “a sudden ban on this activity (trading of animals) may lead to unrest in the farmers community besides affecting their right to choose.”
 
“Karnataka said precautionary measures suggested under the new rules mean that all established markets in the state will have to be built anew. It said that under the new rules the definition of cattle includes all forms of livestock and that a total ban on slaughter may lead to “health care issues in extreme circumstances”—because culling is required to prevent the spread of deadly diseases,” reported Livemint.
 
It further added that “In November last year, the state of Mizoram wrote in, saying restrictions on cattle trade should be “deleted” as “India is a vast country where many groups of people with different culture, traditions and religions are living together peacefully”. The proposed rules, it said, “will definitely hurt the sentiments of various groups of people.”
 
Kerala in its letter also said that sometimes a farmer sells an animal as a last resort to meet financial requirements and that the rules will make it difficult for farmers whose livelihoods depend on dairying.
 
“The rules will lead to non-availability of meat to the common man, adversely affect livelihood of lakhs of people” and “compel farmers to give up dairy farming as it will be impossible for him to sell the unproductive animals,” the Kerala government’s letter said.
 
In August 2017, the Union territory of Chandigarh wrote to the centre, objecting to the fact that the proposed rules will not allow those without agricultural land to purchase cattle “which is against the basic right of a human being”, adding that “dairy farming is a source of income for some families.”
 
The centre did not consult any state representative before forming the legislation.
 
Knew regulation was unconstitutional, yet went ahead with it?
Cattle slaughter is allowed through legislation in states like Kerala, Manipur, West Bengal, Nagaland, Goa and others. “The Union has no business butting into what is essentially a legislative territory of the state, in accordance with local customs and traditions,” reported DailyO.
 
“The Centre’s backdoor entry into something that’s essentially a state matter through the PCA 1960, in which both the Union and the States have joint oversight, is extremely regressive and opens a Pandora’s box of constitutional conundrums. Given that Section 11 (3)c of the PCA 1960 allows slaughter permitted under other laws, the impact of the new ruling would be to curtail the scope of the parent legislation itself,” it reported in 2017.
 
“Meat traders rightly fear that meat supplies would come to a halt, and beef violence would escalate as a result of these patently unfair and, in a way, illegal rules. In addition, these rulings tend to give an air of righteousness to the cow vigilantes, making transportation of cattle for even agricultural purposes a life threatening activity,” it reported.
“Because the Prevention of Cruelty Against Animals Act (1960) is a Central Act, with both the Union and the States having a say and oversight, using PCA to bring in an effective ban on cattle slaughter is a breach of federalism. As argued above, it’s a direct threat to the right to livelihood, right to eat and civil liberties accorded by the Constitution of India,” the report said.
 
This ‘minor confusion’ on the centre’s part has cost real human lives across the country with a sharp rise in lynching cases in 2017. This time again, politicians legislated a policy for political gain while ignoring the fiscal and social reality of a country dependent on animal husbandry, slaughter and export for its GDP. Although it was redacted and modified after backlash, how much time will it take for Modi to espouse the cause of bovine animals to garner votes from the cow belt, a geography where murdering traders and animal farmers is a collateral damage and not a serious crime? 

The post How the govt’s inaction over cattle trade rules allowed cow vigilantism to thrive appeared first on SabrangIndia.

In the first political intervention after the gross lynching, to death, of a dairy farmer in Rajasthan , Pehlu Khan, last week,  leaders of All India Kisan Sabha (AIKS) yesterday visited Jaisinghpur of Nuh District of Haryana to console the bereaved family members of Pehlu Khan, the dairy farmer who was allegedly killed by organisations reported to be a part of the sangh parivar. AIKS leaders including Hannan Mollah, former Member of Parliament (MP) and Polit Bureau Member, Subhashini Ali, General Secretary, P Krishnaprasad, Finance Secretary, Master Sher Singh, President of Haryana Kisan Sabha and Manoj Kumar visited the family of the victims.   Satvir Singh, state president of CITU, Major S L Prajapathy, Gurgaon District secretary of CPIM were also part of the delegation. 

The delegation met Pehlu Khan’s mother Ankuri Begam, wife Jebuna Begam, and two children Irshad and Arif who were also injured in the same incident. Pehlu Khan had six children including four daughters. The delegation also visited Ajmat who is bed ridden at home since he was forcefully discharged from the Alwar Hospital. 

Hundreds villagers gathered to receive the Kisan Sabha leaders.  Ajmal Khan, former MLA,  Kalekhan, former sarpanch, Sarfudheen and Khaleel Ahamad Akthar Hassan of Sahdani Sabha Mewat, Raj Singh and Adv. Arshad khan among others attended the meeting.  The meeting decided to call a panchayath of the people of neighborhood villagers in the next week to mobilise and protest the incidents that signal India's sliding into rank vigilantism.The family of Pehlu Khan has around 1.5 acres of land and is dependant on wheat cultivation and dairying as a means of livelihood. On that fateful day, Pehlu Khan, his two children, his nephew and two other villagers went to Jaipur to purchase milching animals since they hope they could get animals cheap in the Cattle fair of Jaipur Hatwada. 

The Mewat region, dominated by a Muslim population has a rich tradition of Hindu Muslim amity and brotherhood, termed “Gothpal”. The Muslim families are traditionally peasants and cattle breeders. This has been eroded over the decades by the politics of division and othering. The brutal killing of Pehlu Khan by RSS organisations has created fear psychosis and nervousness among the peace loving people. 

The FIR on the lynching clearly states that the mob which attacked the farmers belonged to the Viswa Hindu Parishad (VHP) and Bajrang Dal(BD) and also points to the role of the parent organisation, the RSS. After Pehlu Khan died succumbing to his injuries, district-level leaders of the VHP had even threatened the senior police officers of dire consequences if they arrest any of their activists. The Police, then registered a false FIR against Pehlu Khan and other innocent farmers despite the fact that they have records of the cattle purchase issued by the Jaipur Municipal Corporation.  The Home Minister of Rajasthan has been, shockingly, accusing farmers of 'smuggling' cows by violating the law and even the Union Minister Mukhthar Abbas Naqvi has misguided the Rajya Sabha by denying that any such incident of murder even occurred in Rajasthan.  All this exposes the role of RSS and BJP leaders who appear set to defend the lynch mob in general and those responsible for this gross murder, in particular.

The situation is serious, dragging the country towards anarchy and lawlessness which needs to be fought tooth and nail to protect the democratic rights of the people and to preserve the secular fabric of the society.  The AIKS leadership has demanded a high level enquiry to unearth the conspiracy behind the Alwar Killing. The AIKS leaders also assured the village people and the family members all help to ensure strong action and stringent punishment to the entire culprits as per law including legal aid.

Home Page Photo Courtesy: Indian Express

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