Guwahati, Aug 13: Assam Assembly has on Friday passed the Assam Cattle Preservation Bill, 2021 amid bedlam in the House with Opposition staging a walkout demanding the draft of the Bill be sent to a select committee.
Assam Chief Minister Himanta Biswa Sarma while presenting the Bill for consideration in the Assembly said by stopping cow slaughter this bill will help build communal harmony.
“In lower Assam and Barak Valley there have been several incident of violence between communities due to cow slaughter and beef being found in temples. Our Bill has no ill intension. No good muslim has opposed it,” Sarma said.
The Bill that is awaiting the Governor’s assent was first proposed by Assam Governor Jagdish Mukhi in his welcome speech on the first day of the Assembly after BJP formed government for the second term with CM Sarma at the helm in June this year in order to protect the “sacred animal” that provides us with “life-sustaining milk“.
The oppositions had suggested at least 75 changes in the Bill and had demanded it to be handed over to a Select Committee.
AIUDF legislator Aminul Islam said, “According to statistics, there are 19.327 crore cows in Assam. Cows are not endangered animals, why laws are being sought for conservation?” He further said the matter has been looked at only from a religious perspective.
According to the Bill, cow can only be slaughtered with government permission and only in licenced slaughter houses. The slaughter houses cannot be set within 5 km radius of temples or if non-beef eating communities are in majority, nor can it be sold or purchased there. Cow below the age of 14 years and calf cannot be slaughtered.
The bill also restricts the transportation of cow within and outside the state without permission from the government.
Violation of the proposed law, which is a non bailable offence, will lead to jail term between three to eight years.
The Bill, once passed by the Governor, will repeal the existing Assam Cattle Preservation Act, 1950 that bans cow slaughter. But Section 5 of the earlier Act permitted the slaughter of cattle on the issuance of “fit-for-slaughter” certificates issued by veterinarians if the bovines are over 14 years of age or have become permanently incapacitated for work or breeding due to injury, deformity, or any incurable disease. Section 6 says bovines can be slaughtered only in places specified by authorities, however, Section 13 waives this rule during Eid.
Assam is at the heart of a cow smuggling nexus in which the animal is transported through the porous borders in Karimganj in its south and Dhubri and South Salmara in its west to Bangladesh, while from Assam the animal is transported to Bangladesh via Meghalaya and West Bengal also.
