Gurugram:The Haryana government has notified four special courts to fast-track cases under the Haryana Gauvansh Sanrakshan and Gausamvardhan Act, 2015, which prohibits cow slaughter and regulates the transportation of cattle.
The move comes amid rising criticism from the Opposition over the poor implementation of cow protection law across the state, particularly in Muslim-majority regions like Nuh.
Hearing a bail petition under the Act, Justice Sandeep Moudgil had observed that the primary objective of the legislation is to prevent cow slaughter and curb beef consumption, driven by a powerful meat lobby engaged in the sale and consumption of beef for personal gains.
However, the sharp surge in litigation under the law indicates that the Act is not being enforced in its true spirit, the judge said.
According to a notification issued on 4 March, the jurisdiction of the Nuh, Palwal, Ambala and Hisar special courts will stretch across multiple districts.
Nuh court will cover Nuh, Rewari, Narnaul, Charkhi Dadri and Bhiwani. Palwal court will cover Palwal, Faridabad, Gurugram, Jhajjar, Rohtak, Sonipat and Panipat. Similarly, Ambala court will cover Ambala, Panchkula, Yamunanagar, Kurukshetra and Karnal, and Hisar court will cover Hisar, Jind, Kaithal, Fatehabad and Sirsa.
The courts will be headed by the senior-most Additional District and Sessions Judge and Civil Judge of respective districts.
HaryanaтАЩs stringent cow protection law mandates imprisonment of up to 10 years for cow slaughter, and up to seven years for cow trafficking. The 2015 Act prohibits cow trafficking, possession or consumption of beef, and sale of canned beef.
According to official data, only four of 69 registered cases in the second half of 2022 in Nuh district had resulted in convictions, reflecting an acquittal rate of nearly 94 percent.
The district, predominantly inhabited by Meo Muslims, has witnessed several instances of lynching over allegations of cow slaughter in the last few years. In 2023,a religious procession organised by Vishva Hindu Parishad and Matra Shakti Durga Vahini was attacked, allegedly by hundreds of youths from the Meo Muslim community, leading to clashes that left six dead, over 70 injured, and caused loss of property worth several crores.
Court observations in certain cases under cow protection law have highlighted the lack of substantial evidence in the prosecutionтАЩs claims. In one instance, the judgment explicitly stated that the mere fact of an accused being Muslim cannot automatically imply that he was transporting cows for slaughter.
Speaking to ThePrint, Atfab Ahmed, Congress MLA from Nuh, alleged that most cases in the district were registered in the district without substantial evidence only because the accused happened to be from a minority community, and many accused were acquitted due to fabricated charges.
Nuh district, which has the highest number of cow slaughter cases in the state, is Muslim-dominated.
Ahmed claimed that rather than using the law against the powerful beef lobby, it is often weaponised against the minority community, leading to arbitrary arrests and prolonged legal battles for poor people of the Mewat region.
тАЬThe special courts may not make the difference as existing courts have already been hearing the cases and the accused have been acquitted only because they were falsely implicated. It is a well-known fact that the bulk business in beef is done by people who donтАЩt belong to the minority community, but our people have been framed for cow slaughter for political reasons ever since the BJP (Bharatiya Janata Party) has come to power,тАЭ the MLA told ThePrint.
Sharvan Kumar Garg, chairman of Haryana governmentтАЩs Gau Raksha Aayog, however, said that the special courts will help in improving the conviction rate.
тАЬWhen we have four special courts for cow protection law, where we have public prosecutors trained in various aspects of these laws, the conviction rate is bound to improve,тАЭ Garg told ThePrint.
тАЬOnly a few months back, a court in Nuh convicted two people for cow slaughter, and sentenced them to imprisonment for nine years with fine of Rs 90,000 each because the public prosecutor pleaded the case well. We hope that with special courts, the public prosecutors will be able to prosecute the offenders well.тАЭ
(Edited by Mannat Chugh)
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