Bhilwara Police Registers FIR for Horse Abuse Highlighted by Influencer Following Complaints From PETA India and PFA Bhilwara
In response to an Instagram reel posted by an influencer who goes by the name Ted the Stoner which showed a horse used for weddings being tormented by three men, reportedly in Asind, PETA India and People for Animals Bhilwara made a formal complaint to the superintendent of police for the district of Bhilwara. A first information report has been registered by the Asind police station under Section 289 of the Indian Penal Code, 1860, and sections 3, 11(1)(a), 26, and 38 of The Prevention of Cruelty to Animals (PCA) Act, 1960, against the accused for causing unnecessary pain and suffering to the horse.
In the video, a man who appears to be the groom can be seen sitting on the animal, while two men dance on top of the horse and another person hangs from the horse’s tail, pulling it, twisting it, and performing tricks all while the horse is forced to stand on a charpai (a wooden bed woven with natural fibre ropes). One of the accused has been posting videos on his Instagram profile that show horses being subjected to cruelty as part of “training” them to be used for weddings, in which they “dance” on a charpai and stand on their hind legs, neither of which a horse would naturally do.
As public awareness of cruelty to horses grows, numerous wedding parties are now opting for horse-free baraat options, from simply walking to arriving in fancy cars and even dropping in by helicopter. Celebrity couples whose weddings were horse-free include Alia Bhatt and Ranbir Kapoor, Shahid Kapoor and Mira Rajput, Neil Nitin Mukesh and Rukmini Sahay, Zaheer Khan and Sagarika Ghatge, Neha Dhupia and Angad Bedi, Anushka Sharma and Virat Kohli, Sonam Kapoor and Anand Ahuja, and Varun Dhawan and Natasha Dalal.
Horses used for weddings routinely endure abuse, and this horse was subjected to additional cruelty through the use of a spiked bit. These torture devices are often used to control horses through pain, bloodying their lips and tongues and inflicting psychological trauma and lifelong damage.
