The contentious issue of cow slaughter has been revived with the notification of The Prevention of Cruelty to Animals (Regulation of Livestock Markets) Rules 2017(the Rules) by the Union Government. When cow slaughter was first raised in the Constituent Assembly of India, there was a move to place it under Fundamental Rights. However, by a compromise, it was placed within Directive Principles of State Policy (DPSP), with the caveat that it will not be implemented with coercion by the state. The Supreme Court, which initially placed DPSP (now Article 48) on a lower pedestal than the Fundamental Rights has since modified its position to treat them as equal. However, the emphasis even in Article 48 is on modern animal husbandry more than cow slaughter, and certainly there is no scope for reading into it a total, blanket ban on cow slaughter. Prima facie, then, the Rules, pose a threat to the freedom of profession of all those who are dependent on slaughter of cattle. By notifying these Rules, the Centre has encroached the jurisdiction of the State Legislatures and upended the federal spirit of the country, writes Manuraj Shunmugasundaram, Advocate, Madras High Court and National-Media spokesperson, Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam (DMK) . The present legal position on cow slaughter, he says, may be re-examined in due course when Writ Petitions challenging the Rules are finally heard before the Supreme Court. The author can be contacted at [email protected] Click to read this Issue Brief (HTML)[PDF 423 KB]

  The Hindu Centre for Politics and Public Policy invites you to a Public Discussion on Green Policies and the Legacy of Indira Gandhi Date: July 06, 2017 (Thursday) Time: 6.00 p.m. Venue: Kasturi Srinivasan Hall, The Music Academy, Old no. 306, New no. 168, T.T. Krishnamachari Road, Royapettah, Chennai 600014. Please send your name, email ID and phone number to email: [email protected] or call +914428524445 / 28538153 (10 a.m. to 6 p.m.) Indira Gandhi: A Life in Nature (2017) [External link]

The contentious issue of cow slaughter has been revived with the notification of The Prevention of Cruelty to Animals (Regulation of Livestock Markets

Video: Romila Thapar - In Her Own Words This is an extended video interview with Romila Thapar , Professor Emeritus at the Jawaharlal Nehru University in Delhi, and India’s best-known historian of early India. Prof. Thapar is known for her unwavering commitment to the principles of secularism and equal citizenship, which has often made her the target of attacks by the religious right wing. In this 80-minute interview, which was shot in Washington D.C. in 2004, Prof. Thapar talks about concerns arising from the growth of Hindutva and her own reluctant acceptance of the role of a public intellectual in the face of two equal challenges: The Hindu right’s attacks on professional history via a kind of myth-history and the threat to democracy from political majoritarianism: “One is the attack on professional history …The other is, of course, the much more widespread question of the politics of Hindutva. If this kind of Hindutva history is aimed at what it is aimed at, which is the primacy of the Hindu and the primacy of the Hindu citizen, and Hindu majoritarian rule replacing democracy, then one is opposed to it as a democrat and as a secular intellectual.”Professor Thapar also speaks about her PhD dissertation on Asoka, her early years and initiation into history, her student life in London, the intellectual encounters she has had with the eminent sociologist, M.N. Srinivas, the influence that D.D. Kosambi’s Marxist historiography had on Indian historians, especially her, and about the raid on Somnath Temple and the various versions of it recorded in scriptures and edicts of different times.Prof. Thapar has helped found the famous Centre for Historical Studies at the Jawaharlal Nehru University, Delhi, and is an active proponent of innovative approaches to the study of history. Direction : Chetan Shah Producer : Itty Abraham Interviewer : David Ludden [This article’s headline was updated on June 23, 2017.] Releated Links: 1. Chakravarti R. 2015 . “ Linking the past and the present “, Frontline , September 18. 2. Video of Prof. Thapar’s lecture at Kalakshetra, which was hosted on The Hindu Centre’s website can be accessed here .

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