Supreme Court rejected urgent hearing of PIL seeking total ban on cow slaughter | Today’s news
The Supreme Court on Tuesday refused to grant urgent hearing to a PIL seeking effective implementation of the law imposing a complete ban on cow slaughter before Bakrid.
“You remembered it the day before. No urgency. Thanks,” said a bench of Chief Justice of India Surya Kant and Justice Joymalya Bagchi.
What PIL was looking for
Advocate Barun Kumar Sinha mentioned the matter before the court and demanded an urgent hearing.
“The day after tomorrow is Bakrid. This is a plea that we strive to implement the anti-cow slaughter law. If it can be introduced tomorrow,” Sinha said.
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The suit, filed by Satish Kumar Aggarwal, former vice-president of the Akhil Bharat Hindu Mahasabha, seeks directions to enforce anti-slaughter laws to protect the cow and its offspring from slaughter. It also wants state governments to notify guidelines for regulating slaughterhouses in each individual state in accordance with the law.
Muslim groups are demanding that the cow be declared the national animal
In a related development, several Muslim organizations in Uttar Pradesh have also supported the demand of Maulana Arshad Madani, president of Jamiat Ulama-e-Hind (Arshad Madani faction), to declare the cow as the “national animal”.
Muslim organizations said the move would curb political abuse of the cow slaughter issue and also end incidents of mob lynching and other atrocities committed in its name.
While many are advocating initiatives to build consensus within the community on the issue, some even intend to meet the Prime Minister and Chief Minister in this regard.
Read also | The Supreme Court ordered the removal of stray cattle and dogs from roads and public spaces
Maulana Shahabuddin Razvi, the national president of the All India Muslim Jamaat, wholeheartedly supported Madani’s demand to designate the cow as the “national animal”.
Speaking to PTI, he said that his aim would be to reach a consensus among various Muslim organizations on the issue. For this purpose, a meeting of key representatives of prominent Muslim organizations will soon be convened in Delhi, where a joint memorandum of demands will be drawn up and then submitted to the country’s top leadership, including Prime Minister Narendra Modi.
He argued that the government should fulfill this demand immediately as it would not only bring uniformity in the government’s cow slaughter policy across the country but also help eradicate incidents of mob lynching and other oppressions done in the name of cow slaughter.
Read also | Six months imprisonment, ₹1,000 fine in the Bengal Government Prohibition of Cow Slaughter Ordinance
Siraj Qureshi, president of the All India Qureshi Jamaat – a prominent organization of the Qureshi community involved in the meat trade – said the issue of cow sacrifice has once again become a hot topic in political circles ahead of Eid-ul-Azha (Bakrid) and the unfolding events in West Bengal serve as the latest example of this trend.
He openly supported the demand to declare the cow as the national animal and confirmed that if necessary, his organization would seek a meeting with the Prime Minister in this regard.
Maharashtra to invoke MCOCA for cow slaughter
In Maharashtra, minority commission chairman Pyare Khan on Monday urged the Muslim community to fully comply with the ban on cow slaughter.
“Our sacrifice should be such that it does not cause any inconvenience to anyone else. The government has issued instructions to all collectors, officials and NMC commissioner. A slaughterhouse has been assigned to carry out the sacrifice. We have to cooperate with the administration and the police,” Khan told ANI.
On Saturday, Maharashtra Chief Minister Devendra Fadnavis said that the state government has invoked the Maharashtra Control of Organized Crime Act (MCOCA) for the first time against offenses related to cow smuggling, illegal movement of cattle and illegal slaughterhouses, saying the move would stand up to legal scrutiny.
