Raising Awareness and Turning Heads: PETA India’s Best Demos of 2018
End Elephant Enslavement Demo (5th December’18, Jaipur): Wearing shackles and chains with her hands painted blood red in protest, PETA President Ingrid Newkirk sat beside two volunteers in elephant masks and called on the government to make elephant rides illegal next year. Newkirk also described to the media how she witnessed mahouts beating elephants at Amber Fort where more than 100 elephants are held captive, abused and forced to give tourists rides.
International Animal Rights Day Demo (7th December’18, Mumbai): Newkirk also stopped traffic speaking up for fish: More fish are killed for food each year than all other animals combined, yet they have no legal protection from abuse. Newkirk encouraged Mumbaikers to spare these sensitive aquatic animals the agony of being suffocated, impaled, crushed and cut open – simply by choosing vegan meals.
Children’s Day Demo (13th November’18, Nagpur): Volunteer “baby chicks” inspired Nagpur residents to go vegan by reminding them that the egg industry kills baby male and other unwanted chickens by drowning, burning, crushing and grinding them up. Workers also feed live chicks to other animals and chuck baby birds into rubbish bins.
World Vegan Day Demo ( 31st October’18, Chandigarh): Volunteers from PETA India and Rotaract Club Chandigarh Himalayan wore “bloody” bodysuits to encourage the public to wear only vegan materials, not cruel leather. Cows killed for their skin are crammed onto vehicles so overloaded many do not survive the trip, and are skinned and dismembered while they’re still conscious.
Gandhi Jayanti Demo (1st October’18, Delhi): To reinforce Mahatma Gandhi’s dedication to nonviolence, PETA India supporters wearing elephant, horse, cow, chicken, lion and other animal masks called on the central government to protect animals from continual violence by strengthening animal-protection laws. The penalties for violating the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals Act, 1960—our nation’s chief animal-welfare legislation—are ineffectively weak and fail to deter violence against animals.
World Vegetarian Day Demo (28th September’18, Bangalore): Our supporters wearing cow, buffalo, goat, pig and chicken masks denounced killing and eating animals by unleashing clouds of red powder, reminiscent of countless animals’ blood whom the meat industry murders every day. Inside slaughterhouses, workers hack at animals’ throats with dull blades, usually while they are still conscious and able to feel pain.
World Environment Day Demo (4th June’18, Kolkata): PETA India’s “dead cow”—whose stomach was ripped open and packed with plastic—alerted Kolkata that countless vulnerable land and sea animals suffer and die every day after ingesting huge amounts of plastic trash instead of food, and to responsibly dispose of waste so it doesn’t harm animals.
World Week for Animals in Laboratories Demo (25th April’18, Delhi): Our lifeless, injured “horse” urged the Ministry of Environment, Forest and Climate Change to stop antitoxin producers from using horses like blood banks and leaving them to endure slow, miserable deaths from untreated illnesses and injuries.
Easter Egg Demo (28th March’18, Bangalore): Adarsh Institute of Management and Technology students crammed themselves into cages to remind Bangalore that mother hens on egg farms are locked in cages so small they cannot spread their wings, maimed shortly after birth and sent to the slaughterhouse when they stop producing eggs.
International Day of Forests Demo (20th March’18, Delhi): Our “tiger”, “zebra” and “giraffe” let Delhi know that killing and eating animals is the single largest driver of habitat loss and is directly causing species extinction, especially as meat producers expand their operations in countries with the highest percentage of unique plant and animal species.
St. Patrick’s Day Demo (16th March’18, Kochi): To highlight that eating meat, eggs and dairy “products” wrecks the environment and causes climate change, PETA India members dressed in green encouraged passer-byers to eat healthy, eco- and animal-friendly vegan foods instead.
Holi Demo (28th February’18, Kolkata): PETA India members painted to look like tigers, cheetahs and zebras took to Kolkata’s streets urging residents to steer clear of cruel zoos, which keep animals in horrific conditions and deny them adequate food, water, housing, veterinary care and environmental enrichment.
National Science Day Demo (27TH February’18, Hyderabad): To raise awareness of how cruel and archaic dissecting animals is—which the government instructed higher education officials to prohibit in 2012—a PETA India volunteer took an animal’s place on the dissection table, urging the public to denounce dissecting animals and to report any cases of it in schools and universities to PETA India.
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