Not enough mechanised slaughterhouses in 1995

An argument in favour of mechanised slaughterhouses


Eighty two per cent-it is the same number for the percentage non-vegetarians and percentage Hindus in our polity. So all the anti-meat and slaughter noise is coming from no more than a significant minority. The question is, should the tail be allowed to wag the dog?

There are 3,600 antiquated municipal abattoirs today and a mere five, yes, just five, modern, mechanised ones in India. It is self evident that when antiquated slaughterhouses operate, they create pollution, disease, stink and offence. The critics, as a consequence, have forceful appeal, whether they are green, religiously motivated, swarajists, against export of our animal resources, ahimsa police or assorted camp followers.

It would be callous not to denounce the processes by which most of our “meat” animals are herded to brutal slaughter at municipal establishments with scant concern for their suffering. Where, behind crumbling walls housing inadequate and crude facilities, a grim carnage takes place every single day; where, blood and offal are released into open municipal drains. Where and whereabouts, carcasses piled high on groaning ox carts are thrust along neighbourhood streets as flies buzz and maggots feast.

Still, the demand for meat from the non-vegetarian population both domestic and external won’t go away. If official slaughter is not permitted and organised proficiently, then let us be prepared for illegal and slip shod methods to take their place. And other related issues like the possibility of depletion of our animal resources through mechanised and efficient despatch of animals in modern slaughter houses are valid only if taken in isolation. But then, there are arguments to match against the export of rice or fruit or even cement and steel for that matter. What is the spell that prevents a comprehensive supply side resource mobilisation approach which can address problems like these instead of turning them into taboos?

We could, when it comes to animals reared for meat, insist on accelerated breeding programmes supported by wasteland cultivation of ecologically friendly fodder. We could “beef” up this fodder with vitamins and food additives from our pharmaceutical factories. We could have our cake in terms of draught animals, (though these are almost always bullocks with a lesser role in the procreation process), and eat it too, literally as meat on the table. Because with an 82 per cent preponderance , it should be acknowledged by all parts of the political and economic debate that animals are going to be eaten despite health warnings against excessive meat consumption and religious proscriptions, however strict.

Consider also that it was Prohibition, perhaps, that led a young Mohandas Gandhi to try forbidden meat even though the alleged goat that he clandestinely consumed seemed to bleat in his ears all night!

Mechanised and automated facilities are nothing new after all and cannot be looked at as trail blazers in 1995. Wherever they have been put in, they have reduced the opprobrium associated with animal slaughtering and met a persistent demand in an efficient way.

And for those who criticise all animal slaughter let it be said that being humane calls attention to both ends of the stick. Goats and chickens are part of the religious ritual, particularly as “sacrifice” to several of our religions. And as for cattle and swine, let us ask if it is enough to rush in to protect our cows and pigs against slaughter while letting their brothers and sisters wander on arterial roads causing hazards to human life and limb, half-starved and badly neglected, often diseased and suffering, eating garbage provided by an uncaring populace and always sloppy municipalities?

(600 words)

By Gautam Mukerji
First published on the Edit page of The Economic Timeswww.economictimes.com in 1995

Post script

Today you do have a very vocal PETA ( People for the ethical treatment of animals) and other famous and not so famous animal rights activists. You also have bird-flu outbreaks from time to time. Meat eating, both the "white" and "red" kind goes on unabated and I'm sorry to say the plight of the slaughteree and the state of the abattoirs is no better than when I wrote the above article in 1995.