NEW DELHI – Just days after a Rajasthan High Court said that the cow should be declared the national animal, it has emerged that a Hyderabad high court judge called the cow a “sacred national wealth” which is a “substitute to Mother and God”, The Times of India reported on Friday.
Announcing the order, Judge Rao quoted from a Supreme Court order and said that it is a settled legal position that Muslims have no fundamental right to slaughter healthy cows on the occasion of Bakrid, a TOI report states.
He also directed that veterinary doctors of Telangana and Andhra Pradesh must be brought under the penal net of the AP Cow Slaughter Act, 1977 as many of them allegedly drive healthy cows to slaughter houses by fraudulently certifying that they are unfit for giving milk. In Andhra and Telangana, cow slaughter is allowed if they are certified to be old and unproductive.
According to TOI, cattle trader Ramavath Hanuma had moved the HC after a trial court in Nalgonda had rejected his petition for custody of 65 bovines which were seized from him. The cattle were seized from Kanchanapalli village when Hanuma had brought them there for grazing. As per the allegations of the prosecution, Hanuma, along with other accused, had bought the cattle from farmers for slaughtering them.
Dismissing Hanuma’s plea, Justice Rao said there was no need to interfere in the trial court’s order. He asked whether a person is entitled to claim interim custody of cows and bulls seized from him when he was allegedly taking them to a slaughter house? “This question needs to be posed and answered in view of the national importance of cows which are substitutes to Mother and God,” he said in his order.
The judge also sought amendment of Section 11 and 26 of the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals Act, 1960.
