PETA Demands Police Action Against Horrific Camel Sacrifice
Yesterday , PETA India fired off a letter to the Director General of Police (DGP), UP, calling for the seven families who reportedly and illegally slaughtered a camel in the Varanasi district of Uttar Pradesh on Sunday during Bakrid to be punished to the fullest extent of the law, which would include jail time, and to receive psychiatric evaluations and counselling. The killing reportedly occurred on a busy street in broad daylight amidst children and thousands of other people, many of whom then collected the slain animal’s blood. In the letter, PETA India points out that under The Food Safety and Standards (Food Products Standards and Food Additives) Regulations, 2011, camels cannot be killed for meat and that slaughtering a camel is a punishable offence under The Prevention of Cruelty to Animals (PCA) Act, 1960, as well as section 429 of The Indian Penal Code. The letter also notes that The Prevention of Cruelty to Animals (Slaughter House) Rules, 2001, and The Food Safety and Standards (Licensing and Registration of Food Businesses) Regulations, 2011, require that animals be slaughtered only in facilities registered with the appropriate authorities.
PETA India notes that research in psychology and criminology shows that people who commit acts of cruelty to animals often don’t just stop there – many of them move on to hurting other animals or humans. The US Federal Bureau of Investigation has found that a history of cruelty to animals is one of the traits that regularly appear in its records of serial rapists and murderers, and in a study of battered women, nearly 60 per cent said that they had partners who had harmed or killed their dogs or other animals.
