Mumbai: Observing that the provisions of the UP Prevention of Cow Slaughter Act were “wrongly invoked” against four men in the district of Sitapur, the Allahabad high court had sought a reply from the district superintendent of police in two weeks explaining their reasons for the FIR.
The Sitapur police had registered an FIR under the cow slaughter law in February this year against four men on the basis of a conversation they claimed to have overheard. According to the police, the four accused – Suraj, Ibrahim, Aneesh and Shahzad –were caught discussing their act of slaughtering three calves. All four have been booked under Section 3 and 8 of the UP Prevention of Cow Slaughter Act and have been in custody since February.
The court was hearing the bail application filed by 22-year-old Suraj. He was granted bail upon furnishing a personal bond and two sureties each.
According to a report in The Indian Express, the FIR states that on the basis of a tip-off from an informer, the police team had “carefully crept up to the aforesaid persons and had heard them talking with each other in the bushes that they had slaughtered three calves and have received huge amount of money and that now they were having two bulls in their possession and planned to slaughter them too”.
A bench compirising of Justice Abdul Moin while hearing the bail application of one accused Suraj has observed that “it was simply on the basis of alleged conversation which was overheard by the police” that a case was invoked. The court further said that in the “present case, mere recovery of two bulls from the possession of the applicant and others apart from the other instruments would prima facie indicate that no case under section 3 and 8 of the Act is made out”.
The four accused persons have spent close to three months in jail on the basis of the sections invoked by the Sitapur police. The court observed that prima facie it appears that the sections invoked would “not have attracted in the said incident”.
The Express report states that in the FIR lodged by Senior Sub Inspector Deepak Kumar Pandey it is stated that the accused persons were arrested and “two bulls, one bundle of rope, one hammer, one ghadasa (small), one ghadasa (big), one nail and 12 empty packets of 5 kg each were recovered” were found in their possession. The Additional Government Advocate (AGA) had submitted that once “the instruments and two bulls” were recovered, it was clear that the accused persons were in the process of slaughtering the bulls. The AGA, according to the Express report, had argued that on the basis of the conversation overheard by the team, “a clear case of cow slaughter” is made out against the applicant.
Defence lawyer Dileep Kumar Yadav had argued that “mere recovery from the possession of the applicant the two bulls and other instruments would not make out a case” to invoke provisions of the Act. The court, referring to the FIR, stated: “it clearly comes out that neither the bulls which were found in possession of the applicant had been slaughtered nor were maimed or had any physical injury”.