The year was 2014. The Indian National Congress had successfully completed another five years of doing nothing. The whole nation was desperate for a change. I (who was just 18 then) was eagerly watching the elections results being declared. The elections, which were to be fate of 1.3 billion people, had been made all about one man – the then Gujarat Chief Minister and the current Prime Minister Narendra Modi. Like millions of other Indians, I too was washed away by the Modi wave. The Gujarat Development model was what lured me. Though some may call it hoax, (mostly because they had nothing else to say against him other than the 2002 riots), I had various other first-hand sources confirming the astonishing growth the region had seen. Not only Gujarat, but also other BJP states like Madhya Pradesh had a similar story to tell. All that aside, a person with no political background doesn’t win four elections in a row if he is no good. And I wanted that for Tamil Nadu or for the whole of India for that matter. But today after almost 3 years of BJP rule, I am unsure of where the Indian economy stands and dubious of any significant development (which may be because I am stuck in a state that has been politically isolated from the rest of India in recent times). But what now concerns me the most is the very recent Beef Ban.
The term Beef Ban, which has been made quite popular, seems to be an intentional error. The new rules did not ban beef on any level but were only to control the unregulated sale of cattle (cows, bulls, bullocks, buffaloes, calves, camels). These rules prohibit the sale of animals for slaughter and religious sacrifices at livestock markets and animal fairs alone. This move is said to ensure food safety standards by improving the traceability and preventing the sale of sick cattle. And it also supposedly weeds out the middlemen thus increasing the farmer’s profit.
But some things around it just don’t seem to add up.
The new law has in no way banned beef. Animals for slaughter can still be bought directly from farms. And this vital fact was in no way publicized by the government.
The government doesn’t seem to advertise the fact that beef can still be consumed, despite it facing severe criticism regarding how banning beef will deny beef eaters of their fundamental right.
The Congress which is highly critical of the BJP (just as Judy is of Monica) has been unusually quiet on the issue except for the one untowardly incident in Kerala.
A common man’s understanding of the issue is a Hindu inclining party trying to appease the sentiments of the Hindus and taking the nation on a non-secular and non-tolerant path. The left have done everything possible to paint the issue in saffron. And the centre seems to be unusually okay with it. No high profile individual has clarified the popular misconception that beef has been banned. They rather seem to want the people to believe that beef has been banned. The issue has been thoroughly drenched in religion and ideology deliberately (a Trojan horse of sorts) such that a few other key aspects have been well overshadowed.
Let us see how the new PCA act (Prevention of Cruelty to Animals) affects the actual owners of cattle. The new rules enforce strict regulations in cattle trading (for non-slaughter purposes). In India, regulation is just a synonym for tedious and tiresome paperwork tied up with bullying by government officials. Animals must be necessarily vaccinated to be eligible for sale at farmers market thus adding to the expenses (But boosting the profit of few others). As in the case of cattle sale for slaughter, the scenario is much worse. With the curbing of inter-state cattle trade, the sale of cattle for meat will take a severe blow in states like Tamil Nadu as the demand is mostly from Kerala and the beef consumption within the state is also minimal. For an ordinary farmer, this would cause a huge revenue loss of around 15 to 30 thousand rupees. All this will severely discourage the rearing of bulls – the male cows that don’t give you milk. Bulls will be rendered economically useless if it weren’t for their meat.
Now let’s see. ‘Bulls becoming economically useless’ – doesn’t that sound a little too familiar, especially to us, the Tamil people. Yes, the devil does seem to come in many forms. This January, we witnessed the outbreak of widespread protests in Tamil Nadu against the ban on Jallikattu. While the Jallikattu ban was merely the packaging, the core package was all about corporate attempt to curb the rearing of indigenous cattle breeds. After strong protests, which were of an unprecedented nature and magnitude in post-independence India, the cause of the Tamil people bore fruit. Not that it has something to do with this, but still strangely enough, the one liberalist entity that has expressed high acclaim for the new laws is the Peta and its associates (like Maneka Gandhi).
One doesn’t need to do much thinking, to realize that the consequence of the so called beef ban would also exact the same toll on the indigenous cattle population as the ban on Jallikattu would have. I do not know if destruction of the indigenous cattle species is the intention of the beef ban but it definitely seems to be an important implication. To me, the answer to the question ‘Why beef ban?’ will not just determine if the BJP is populist or sell-out but also my vote in the next general elections. And I desperately hope that it is the former.
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