New Delhi: The Supreme Court has issued contempt notices to three states - Rajasthan, Haryana, and Uttar Pradesh - for allegedly failing to stop incidents of cow vigilantism despite the top court's order last year to do so. The states have been asked to reply to the notice by April 3.
The contempt petition has been filed by Tushar Gandhi, the great grandson of Mahatma Gandhi, saying the three states have not complied with the top court order of September 6 last year.
Senior advocate Indira Jaising, appearing for Gandhi, said that despite the apex court order, violent incidents were still being witnessed in various parts of these states.
In September 2017, the top court ordered state governments to form a dedicated task force in every district to stop such acts of violence. It had also asked their chief secretaries to file status report giving details of actions taken by them to prevent incidents of cow vigilantism.
The bench also said that states shall nominate a senior police officer, preferably of the rank of Deputy Superintendent of Police, to ensure that vigilante groups don't take the law into their hands or "behave as if they are law in themselves".
It had said that "some kind of planned action is required so that vigilantism does not grow" and efforts have to be made to stop such vigilantism.
"How will they (states) do it is their business, but this must stop," the bench had observed.
Prime Minister Modi and the then President Pranab Mukherjee condemned the killings over cow protection.
"To make up for a child's loss, I have seen the cow getting sacrificed. And now when I hear we are killing people in the name of a cow, we are no one to take law in our hands," PM Modi said, adding violence was not the solution.
Then President Pranab Mukherjee too came down heavily on self-proclaimed gau rakshaks, saying, "When mob frenzy becomes so high, irrational and uncontrollable, we have to pause and reflect."
The issue of cow protection has taken the centrestage, particularly in the light of several cases in which Muslims have come under attack.
On July 22, 2017, Junaid, a 15-year-old boy from Haryana, was stabbed to death by a mob on a train over the suspicion that he was carrying beef.
In April 2017, Pehlu Khan, a 55-year-old farmer from Haryana, was also murdered by cow protectors in Rajasthan while transporting cows legally purchased from a market in Jaipur.
Mohammad Akhlaq, a resident of Bisada village in Greater Noida was lynched in 2015 on suspicion of storing beef in his fridge.
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