Hours after Qasim Abdullah Hayat was arrested on charges of transporting beef in Gujarat’s Panchmahal district–Qasim committed suicide. An FIR was filed against the 32-year old at Godhra B Division Police on September 15. He had been arrested for allegedly carrying cow meat for delivery. Those who he was allegedly going to deliver the meat to were also charged in the same FIR.
Godhra B Division Police received a tip-off that Qasim was riding a two-wheeler from Sevaliya to Godhra with beef in the luggage compartment. The FIR was filed at the police station on September 14. The accused were booked under section 429 (mischief by killing or maiming cattle) of the Indian Penal Code, section 11 (treating animals cruelly) of the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals Act, 1960, and under the Gujarat Animal Preservation (Amendment) Act, 2017.
The BJP-ruled Gujarat has one of the harshest anti-cow slaughter laws in the country. Conviction under the Gujarat Animal Preservation (Amendment) Act, 2017, can earn accused persons upto a life term in jail.
Indian Express reported that Qasim’s death was captured on the police station lockup’s CCTV camera as having occurred at 3.20 am on Thursday, September 16. Qasim’s family has demanded a fair investigation into his death. He had told police he was carrying mutton, not beef, but that he had told police that he had transported beef a couple of days ago.
A veterinary doctor, who was called in to identify the meat said it was beef but advised that a sample should be sent to the Forensic Science Laboratory (FSL) in Surat for confirmation. Express reported that meat was then weighed before the witnesses and measured to be 25 kilos and worth Rs 5500. The sample of the beef was then sealed in a box with the stamp of the district animal hospital of Godhra and sent for test to the Surat FSL while the police disposed of the remaining meat by burying it in a grazing land in presence of witnesses, as per provisions of the cow protection law, the FIR states.
