The >ban in Maharashtra will largely affect Mumbai and Pune which play a pivotal role in making India the world’s second largest exporter of beef. It will promote widespread unemployment and result in deleterious consequences for Maharashtra’s burgeoning food industry. The ban must be seen as a bid to deprive a large religious group the right to act in consonance with its religious beliefs in a State that has traditionally been a microcosm of India’s diversity. It may even be a harbinger of things to come.
If the so-called champions of Hinduism are pained by the “suffering of cows” as they would have us believe, they would do well to take substantive efforts to ensure that cows, that help enhance agricultural productivity, are well-fed and properly maintained, instead of having to loiter around garbage dumps as seems to be the norm in many parts of India.
Rahul Bajaj,
Nagpur
