A Muslim cleric Tanveer Hashmi – head of Hashim Pir Dargah in Karnataka’s Vijayapura, was caught on camera saying that cows would be sacrificed during the festival of Bakrid, PTI has reported.
The report claims that this comment was made during the Ramzan prayer sermon on Saturday. It is also been reported that this controversial statement was made in presence of a Karnataka Congress minister Shivanand Patil.
As per the report, Patil who is the state’s Family welfare minister, did not raise objection to the cleric’s statement, despite the fact that cow slaughter is banned [PDF] in the state.
A local NEWS9 report shared the video clip of the cleric making the controversial statement:
#BIGNEWS: #Vijayapura cleric #TanveerPeeraHashmi in an inflammatory statement said, there will be #CowSlaughter again. The statement was made in the presence of minister #ShivanandPatil. Following #criticism, the cleric clarified by claiming his statement was not #provocative. pic.twitter.com/jiKOfmsG4k
— NEWS9 (@NEWS9TWEETS) June 16, 2018
As per the video and translation provided, the minister is heard saying that during Bakrid, the devil will do mischief with regards to cow sacrifice. He then says that, it shouldn’t be the case that another sacrifice takes place along with the cow’s sacrifice – to much cheers from the crowd. He was later also heard expressing hope that his listeners would pay attention to his words.
Incidentally it isn’t the only time the Congress has been caught in an embarrassing position with regards to cow slaughter.
About a year back, it was reported how Youth Congress workers in Kerala had horrifyingly slaughtered a calf in full public view in order to protest against the Modi government’s notification to restrict the sale of cattle in the markets for slaughter purposes.
This tryst with cow slaughter didn’t end here, and a few days following the incident, a Kerala Congress MLA was seen eating beef with his friends to express solidarity with cow slaughter.
