By Mushtaque Rahmat for Twocircles.net
A few days ago, Mohan Bhagwat asked for an all-India ban on cow slaughter. I once for all can’t agree more than this. We must have a complete ban on cow slaughter in the whole of India. But hold on why only cow! I am sure all will agree for buffalo, goats, chicken and fish too (although fish are not slaughtered!). And this law should prevail on all legal and so-called “disputed” slaughter houses irrespective of its market: domestic consumption or export. And these “slaughter” must encompass “killing” of all animals either natural or manmade.
As per The Tribune’s report published in August 2016, “The Rajasthan government on Saturday said 8,122 cows have died at Asia’s “best” Hingonia Gaushala between January 1 and July 31 this year due to ill-health and accidental injuries. On an average, 1,053 cows die every month at this very centre, while over 500 have perished in last 10 days”.
Incidentally, Rajasthan is a BJP-ruled state. It is time for Guarakshaks or I will borrow another terminology from Samar Harlankar “Gauatankwadi” to exact revenge from Vijayaraje Scindia, her ministers, MLAs and officials for being complicit in deaths of holy cows! After all hanging of cows’ killer was suggested by another BJP Chief Minister. As saying goes “Charity begins at home”.
Lately, there have been intense debates from all those sane minds on the legality and legitimacy of Cow vigilante or “gauantankwadis’ “goonda raj. And their machismo of trailing cattle carrying truck, the lynching of Muslim men accompanying truck. One wonders why not a single truck carrying cows/buffaloes to India’s few largest abattoir whose owners, reportedly, are Hindu or at least not Muslim never got snared by these faithful defendants of cows? And how are these big slaughterhouses getting supplies? Are their supplies airlifted, probably? Or sent invisibly? Or there is connivance between the Gaurakshaks and big slayer of animals. It is mutually beneficial; Gaurakhshaks are securing the supply line of big factories earning “simultaneous” praise from their protectors (politicians). And protectors get votes by portraying Muslims as the “killer” of their beloved cows.
According to one economic report, India is the largest beef exporters in the world leaving erstwhile top position holder Brazil behind. India’s total export of beef stands at 1.8 million metric tonnes in the year 2016. In fact, Modi, in his election rallies of 2014 general election attacked the then UPA government for promoting “Pink Revolution”, has earned the distinction of culminating it in his own rule. Gaurakhshaks must listen and follow the act of their master!
India has much more pressing problems begging our collective attention and actions. Some of the basic necessities of life are traded as a luxury. India is home to more than a billion souls out of which 77 million men, women and children do not have access to clean and safe drinking water. Our ground water table has consistently been depleting. And politicians are not wasting a moment not to work on this. Water crisis, which would lead to political unrest, poverty and inequality, is staring at our face. But we are busy in killing humans for the sake of cow. It is most likely our next generation will die from lack of water than cows!
We are called “world capital of open defecation”. We are lagging behind Bangladesh, Bhutan and China in terms of access to improved sanitation. As per WHO’s report only 40% of India’s population has access to proper sanitation compared to China’s 77%. Our poor neighbour Bhutan (50%) fares better than us. The World Bank estimates that 21 percent of communicable diseases in India are linked to unsafe water and the lack of hygiene practices.
Further, over 500 children under the age of five die each day from diarrhoea in India alone. In India, we lose 48 babies for every thousand live birth to various diseases, malnutrition of pregnant women, and lack of medical facilities. Bangladesh, Bhutan and China fare much better than us. Still, we never cease boasting as big brother of this region.
It goes without saying that we have one of the worst public health facilities in the world. Ours is among the highest out of pocket expenditure on medical treatment. Our record for maternal mortality is the most shameful of all. It is six times higher than China’s 27 deaths per 1000 live births.
Income distribution of a nation is, generally, a consequence of policy it has chosen in the present and past. According to a report by the Johannesburg-based company New World Wealth, India is the second-most-unequal country globally, with millionaires controlling 54% of its wealth. With a total individual wealth of $5,600 billion, it’s among the 10 richest countries in the world – and yet the average Indian is relatively poor. Compare this with Japan, the most equal country in the world, where according to the report millionaires control only 22% of total wealth.
In India, the richest 1% own 53% of the country’s wealth, according to the latest data from Credit Suisse. The richest 5% own 68.6%, while the top 10% have 76.3%. At the other end of the pyramid, the poorer half jostles for a mere 4.1% of national wealth. What’s more, things are getting better for the rich. The Credit Suisse data shows that India’s richest 1% owned just 36.8% of the country’s wealth in 2000, while the share of the top 10% was 65.9%. Since then they have steadily increased their share of the pie. The share of the top 1% now exceeds 50%.
This is far ahead of the United States, where the richest 1% own 37.3% of total wealth. But India’s finest still have a long way to go before they match Russia, where the top 1% owns a stupendous 70.3% of the country’s wealth.
This sharp rise in inequality in India is damaging, and we as a nation need to make an effort to curb it. Rising inequality will lead to slower poverty reduction, undermine the sustainability of economic growth, compound the inequalities between men and women and drive inequalities in health, education and life chances.
Make in India, Digital India and similar slogan were given by our Prime Minister since coming to power, giving an illusion of great things to come in a flash. As if we are only short of slogans. In reality, according to one report, India continues to perform poorly in the “incidence and location of innovation” with international patent applications filed from the country dropping slightly to 1,423 last year (2015)—as compared to Japan’s 44,235, China’s 29,846 and South Korea’s 14,626 in the same period. Even some companies alone were filing more patents than our country does: the three top companies that filed the highest number of patent applications in 2015 were China’s Huawei Technologies with 3,898 patent applications, followed by US-based Qualcomm (2,442) and China’s ZTE Corp. (2,155). Patents filing, in general, are considered as the measure of the spread of science and technology of a country, besides its obvious monetary value to individuals and to nations.
Although we are very proud of our education system and great institutions, none of these feature in the latest top 100 universities’ ranking released by QS World University Rankings in 2015. There could be several reasons for this dismal performance. Our focus isn’t there where it is needed most. Children are future of any nation. The present political and social milieu have let orphans off our radar. There are almost 20 million orphan children which are accounted for. There could easily be another million never registered. In Maharashtra government pay rupees 70 per day for the meal of a cow and for orphans kids it is just rupees 30. This comparison speaks volumes of our nation’s priority.
India spends millions on cow shelters all around the country leaving its 88 million citizens without a cover on their heads. India is home to largest homeless people. However, this does not include people with inadequate housing.
Rajasthan has the highest proportion of homeless people, it is the same state that has the distinction of killing cow trader Pehlu Khan at the hands of “Gaurakshaks”. Uttar Pradesh, Maharashtra, Rajasthan and Madhya Pradesh account for about half the country’s homeless population.
Interestingly, all these states are under BJP rule and these governments are fully taken over by their love for cow and Gaushalas. But one hardly hear anything on the resolution of housing problems.
Probably as a nation we have gone astray. There are some real and hard issues which we have to grapple and overcome. A nation as diverse and great as India can’t stoop so low where human life comes cheaper than animals. Time has come to put our leaders to tasks of putting Manavraksha first instead of Gauraksha! Jai Hind!