J&K to use Public Safety Act against cow smugglers

Srinagar: As a 123-year-old law that banned slaughter of cow and other bovine animals and sale of beef in Jammu and Kashmir was annulled with the erstwhile state being formally stripped of its special status and split up into two Union Territories (UTs) on October 31 this year, the police will now invoke its stringent Public Safety Act (PSA) to cope with the issue.

J&K’s police chief Dilbag Singh on Monday while asking his men to book bovine smugglers and drug peddlers under the PSA said that the district police heads should make strong cases against the offenders.

“He directed the district SSPs to make strong cases against the identified individuals who are habitual offenders in drug peddling and bovine smuggling,” a statement issued by the police in Jammu said after the DGP chaired a meeting of officers in the winter capital to assess the crime and security situation in the UT.

The police chief, according to the statement, also said that the process of registering such cases and presenting charge-sheets in these should be on fast track and the culprits booked under the PSA.

Under the PSA, which was introduced in J&K in 1978 initially to discourage timber smuggling but often used by the successive governments against their political opponents, a person can be detained up to a period of two years without seeking a formal trial. However, such detentions are subject to periodical reviews by an official screening committee and can be challenged in open courts as well.

Section 298-A, 298-B, 298-C and 298-D of the erstwhile state’s own Ranbir Penal Code (RPC), 1932 declared slaughter of bovine animals including cow and the sale of beef punishable offences.

These sections of the law said that voluntary slaughter of any bovine animal such as cow, ox, bull or calf shall be punished with imprisonment of either description which may extend to 10 years and shall also be liable to fine.