Dhyan Foundation aided by PFA holds peaceful Car Rally against Cow Smuggling in Odisha & Dog Culling in Kerala
Cabinet Minister Maneka Gandhi, Jagpreet Luthra of Gau Gyan Foundation, along with Dhyan Foundation and other ngos like Group of Animal Lovers seek CM’s intervention in checking cattle-smuggling through Odisha, demand action against Balasore Police officials “aiding the cattle-smugglers”
“Nothing short of your personal attention to the matter would do,” activists tell CM
They sought Chief Minister Naveen Patnaik’s personal intervention in checking cattle-smuggling through Odisha and demanded action against the police officials aiding the crime.
“Repeated pleas to the police to enforce the animal welfare laws and to protect the mute animals against smuggling/slaughter have fallen on deaf ears,” the letter read.
“It is common knowledge that smuggling of cattle from Odisha into West Bengal is rampant and the police largely turn a blind eye to the crime or are hand-in-glove with the cattle mafia. The police complicity in the crime is what explains its alarming proportions,” explained Jagpreet Luthra who has been working on the ground and was at the Odisha Bhawan, to handover the letter to Odisha’s Resident Commissioner in Delhi—after a peaceful demonstration organised by Dhyan Foundation, supported by PFA (People For Animals), under the banner of “United Humans Against Atrocities on Animals”, attended by about 200 animal welfare activists outside Orissa Nivas in Chanakyapuri on Friday.
Yogi Ashwini, the guiding light of Dhyan Foundation, says: “All positive and negative karma comes back to us manifold, animal pain reaches divine, straight, the effects are disastrous when the wheel of karma moves. Stop insanely killing innocent animal or else… Dhyan Foundation, under the guidance of Yogi Ashwini has been working actively to rehabilitate, nurse and provide for rescued, injured, sick and abandoned cattles and stray dogs through a country wide network of over 25 shelters, feeding points, rescue-rehabilitation work, emergency services to name a few.
A few of the activists went inside to speak with the officials. They sought the CM of Odisha’s intervention in the flourishing illegal cattle trade. “We met the Resident Commissioner and he agreed to forward our request to the Chief Minister and the home and animal husbandry departments. As law abiding citizens we are not going to be silent spectators to the rising atrocities against animals,” said Nikita Anand, Miss India Universe and spokesperson Dhyan Foundation.
The Balasore police officials named in the letter are: DSP(Crime) and SDPO Amresh Panda, Khantapada IIC Sudarshan Das, Jaleswar PS IIC Chandan Gadhai, Sadar IIC Dayanidhi Dash and Industrial IIC Paresh Rout.
“It was only when the SP of Bhadrak, from where the trucks had been coming, put his foot down against the illegality that the Balasore police stopped facilitating the illegal transportation.”
This, the letter said, was “a telling example of how the Balasore police are aiding the crime of cattle-smuggling/slaughter.”
The said acts of cattle smuggling in Balasore district of Odisha are in violation of the Orissa Prevention of Cow Slaughter Act, 1960, the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals Act, 1960 and the Motor Vehicles Act.
According to Gau Gyan Foundation, on an average, 100 trucks, sealed containers and pick-up vans pass through Balasore each day, mostly during the night and wee hours of the morning. Translated into numbers, it means a daily average of 5,000 cattle smuggled into the slaughter houses of West Bengal and Bangladesh. NH 5 and, to a lesser extent, NH 6, invite traffic from all over Odisha, also from Andhra Pradesh, Telangana, Chhattisgarh and Jharkhand. In October 2013, GGF gave the then DGP of Odisha photographic evidence about cow slaughter happening openly in Jamu Sahi, Khorda. The slaughter continues till date, allege activists.
Earlier during the day, the rally went to Kerala House to meet the Resident Commissioner against the brutal killings of dogs in the state, which has beaten all records of monstrosity against animals. Participating in the rally were people from all walks of life from students to housewives, from country heads to businessmen, as one voice of “United Humans Against Atrocities on Animals”.
“The resident commissioner, assured that the Kerala government will take the strongest action against those who are violating the law by killing dogs… He also promised action against those who support this brutal and senseless killing.” says Miss India Universe and spokesperson Dhyan Foundation Nikita Anand.
