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CRUELTY TO ANIMALS
By : M.R.Sethi
“Ahimsa Parmodharma
(Non-violence is the highest virtue), said the Buddha. But today’s
world is full of mindless violence. This violence is most
prominently visible in man’s relation to animals. "Animals are so
agreeable friends," said George Eliot. "they ask no questions, they
pass no criticisms."
It is man who has betrayed this friendship and has proved
treacherous to his animal friends. Man's relation to the beast is
marked by indifference, callousness and hideous cruelty.
Cruelty to animals has become a common feature of our life. We
perpetrate a lot of brutality on animals without the slightest qualm
of conscience. In India, it is a common sight to see emaciated and
half-fed horses and ponies dragging victorias and ‘tongas’ (horse
carriages) full of people. The beast which is often just a bundle of
bones pulls the human parasites with all its might. The condition
of these animals is so poor that sometimes one wonders what keeps
them going. Similar is the case I with bullocks and donkeys. In
Indian villages, despite the coming of tractors, oxen are still
yoked to ploughs and used for pulling bullock carts. Bullocks with
gaping wounds drag carts and, as if this misery is not enough, get
the whips crack on their backs. We accept all these instances of
cruelty to animals with equanimity. There is indeed no limit to
man's ingratitude. Milch cattle are also treated in the same way.
The condition of cows in Indian cities is an example of the
hypocrisy of the Indians. They regard the cow as sacred and would
readily indulge in violence if a person talks cow-slaughter or even
of eating beef. But a cow is looked after only as long as it can
yield milk. And when it becomes dry it is let loose in the streets
to feed on garbage. (Garbage in the streets is India’s USP). In
small cities, many unscrupulous owners milk their cows in the
morning and let them loose during the day -- where they feed on
rubbish and whatever stale eatables are thrown out by the people --
only to be taken back in the evening for milking again.
Technology is also responsible for the plight of the animals.
While technology has helped man to lead a better and more
comfortable life, it has in most cases, meant only more misery to
the poor animal. Technology has helped man develop inhuman ways of
rearing animals. In advanced poultry farms, chickens are kept in
darkness or semi-darkness. This tells upon their health and
behaviour. They become vicious and start fighting.
George Orwell, in his novel "Animal Farm", makes old Major a pig
and leader of the animals say: "Man is the only creature that
consumes without producing. He does not give milk, he does not lay
eggs, he is too weak to pull the plough, and he cannot run fast
enough to catch rabbits. Yet he is lord of all the animals. He sets
them to work; he gives back to them the bare minimum that will
prevent them from starving, arid the rest he keeps for himself. Our
labor tills the soil, our dung fertilizes it, and yet there is not
one of us that owns more than his bare skin . . . And even the
miserable lives we lead are not allowed to reach their natural span,
No animal escapes the cruel knife in the end."
India is a wonderful country. In streets you can find stray animals
like cows, dogs, pigs and monkeys roaming as freely as human beings.
In Indian streets one can find mangy, starved dogs with their bones
jutting out, scrounging for putrid food in garbage heaps. Those dogs
cannot escape the mischief of urchins who take infinite delight in
stoning the defenseless creatures. Children in some parts of India
have developed a notoriously ingenious device of catching cats. A
cat is forced to enter a room. Then a boy shuts himself in the room
along with the cat. All doors are shut except one which is left a
little ajar. Outside the slightly open door another boy waits with
an open gunny bag and holds it close to the opening. The boy inside
the room coaxes the cat out which, in its attempt to get out of the
room, slips into the hag. The boys then close the mouth of the bag
and beat the cat with sticks. The groans of the cat inside the bag
are heart-rending. In most of the cases, the cat dies.
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