Lets stop cruelty towards Cows (and all other animals)

3rd July 2011 - Times of India News article

New Delhi: Be cruel to your pet or any other animal at your own peril. For, an offender could end up paying up to Rs.1 crore as fine or be jailed for up to five years. The environment and forests ministry has proposed this hefty fine in its Animal Welfare Bill, 2011 (www.awbi.org). For institutions or companies that show cruelty towards animals, the penalty would be a whopping . 25 crore.

The proposed bill empowers the Centre to fix fines and penalties based on the severity of offence. It aims to regulate welfare of pets and animals used in performances and for scientific experiments. It would be construed as an offence if you don’t take reasonable steps to ensure that the pet gets a suitable environment and diet, protection from pain, suffering and diseases.

“If any person beats, kicks, over-rides, overdrives, over-loads, tortures or otherwise treats any animal so as to subject it to unnecessary pain or suffering’ or permits such cruelty, he or she would be liable for penalty under the act when and if passed by Parliament,” says the provisions in the proposed bill. Keeping animals chained for “unreasonable time” or abandoning a pet, or keeping it caged in a space that does not “permit the animal a reasonable opportunity for movement” would call for invoking the penal clause.

If an individual files a complaint against a petowner before a magistrate, police commissioner or SP in writing, the officer can send a sub-inspector to the ‘errant’ person’s house to ascertain the truth. The officer can carry out search and seizure under the provisions of the Code of Criminal Procedure. The courts could debar you forever from keeping a pet if they find you have been cruel before. However, there are several caveats to such a fiat. PETA India also have a case on in the Supreme Court against illegal treatment of animals during transport and slaughter. We too find that despite laws being in place, they are routinely flouted and cows and other poor animals are slaughtered and that too in the cruellest ways.