The dust hasn’t yet settled on the Dadri lynching case, though there might yet be more heat on the UP government as the report submitted by them to the Centre makes no mention of the circumstances surrounding the ‘rumours’ of beef consumption that led to the killing of Mohammad Akhlaq. The UP government banned the slaughter of cows and bulls around six decades ago and since then over 3,000 people have been booked for the illegal sale and smuggling of the banned meat.
Union minister Mahesh Sharma made relatively controversial statements regarding the lynching, stating that there was no communal colour to the incident, but it’s hard to ignore the facts that stare everyone in the face. This incident cannot be looked at in isolation.
Over the past year there have been announcements by state governments, Maharashtra in particular, that have banned cow slaughter and subsequently the sale and by direct relation the consumption of beef. Over 26 states and union territories have banned the slaughter of cows and bulls. Only eight states allow the sale and slaughter of bovines, while two allow the sale but there are conditions regarding slaughter. States like Punjab, Haryana, Himachal Pradesh and Rajasthan have a complete ban on bovines, while Haryana and Maharashtra have extremely strict penalties for those breaking the law. In Maharashtra for instance, the penalty is up to five years in prison with a fine of about Rs 10,000. The state has faced a lot of flak in the recent past for even banning the sale of all meat during a Jain festival. Tens of thousands of people involved in the beef trade in Maharashtra have had to look out for new avenues of income. Almost all of them are Muslims.
Perhaps the seeds for this incident lie in the recent bans on bovine or cow and bull slaughter, which vary from state to state. It doesn’t help that Mahesh Sharma, who is incidentally the union minister for culture, makes statements where he vows to cleanse public life ‘polluted’ by Western influences. The eating of meat is looked on as an outside influence and the purview of the minorities, the growing Muslim population in particular. Statistics which show that almost 70 percent of Indians are meat eaters do not count, especially in a country now ruled by right wing forces.
The murder of Mohammed Akhlaq happened in a state that has always had a problem with the law. Akilesh Yadav and the Samajwadi party have not managed to maintain some semblance of law and order and have now turned their guns on the ruling BJP. Conspiracy theories point to a dislodging of faith in the SP by forces aligned to the BJP.
Irrespective of that, the murder clearly proves that when this pluralistic nation gets polarised on the basis of the right to eat beef or not, it is then that extremism will rear an ugly head. India has always been a country of diverse religions and cultural traditions. Murders like this, in a lawless state or in a safe one, challenge the essence of secular India, because of the logic the murder was predicated on.
