Modernising Slaughterhouses - Economic and Political Weekly

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Oct 6, 2012 ... Modernising Slaughterhouses. Defining Backwardness ... modern abattoir in Devnar is not only highly desirable, in fact, it is long overdue.
The

O c t o b e r 6. 1962

Volume XIV No 40

EDITORIALS Modernising Slaughterhouses Defining Backwardness

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WEEKLY NOTES The Oil Gap — Economics of Expansion — Ship India: Indiawards — A Lawyer on Right to 1561 Legal Defence LETTER TO EDITOR Horse Trading or Rational Choice?

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CAPITAL VIEW The Missing Deputy Leader — Romnesh Thapar

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OUR CALCUTTA LETTER Subramaniam on Steel

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OUR DELHI LETTER Industrial Policy Reappraisal

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LETTER FROM SOUTH Kerala's Predicament

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FROM THE LONDON END Anglo-US Differences on World Liquidity BOOK REVIEW Economic Handbooks, Not Planning Guides Yet SPECIAL ARTICLES — The Optimum Firm Optimum Form — I — Raj Krishna

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More on Devaluation — Jagdish Bhagwati

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AROUND BOMBAY MARKETS Dalal Street Is Off Colour

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FROM THE CHAIR The Imperial Tobacco Company of India Limited Industrial Finance Corporation of India Jay Engineering Works Limited The Jaipur Udyog Limited CURRENT STATISTICS T H E ECONOMIC W E E K L Y

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Modernising

Missing

Deputy

Leader

Price 50 Naye Paise

Slaughterhouses

T H O S E who have any knowledge of the a p p a l l i n g c o n d i t i o n of the slaughterhouses i n this country w i l l be more than perplexed by the a g i t a t i o n against the proposal for setting up a m o d e r n slaughterhouse in Devnar near Bombay. The slaughterhouse in B a n d r a is so abominable that it is a standing disgrace for the C i t y . The proposal of setting up a modern abattoir in Devnar is not only h i g h l y desirable, in fact, it is l o n g overdue. To suggest t h a t k i l l i n g of animals can be made more humane or that it can be less cruel and p a i n f u l to the animals may be dismissed offhand as h y p o c r i t i c a l nonsense by those w h o revolt at the thought of k i l l i n g animals f o r food. B u i even staunch vegetarians w h o detest meat-eating should not f a i l to see that conditions of slaughterhouses can be vastly i m p r o v e d f r o m the general p u b l i c health and hygienic p o i n t of view, that the d i r t and filth found in most slaughterhouses can be and should be eliminated and that there is a great deal of wastage of animal products of considerable economic value w h i c h can be prevented and byproducts utilised to considerable advantage by modernising these establishments. T h e attitude to these questions, however, is so strongly coloured by emotions that vegetarians choose to ignore that there are slaughterhouses, that" the vast m a j o r i t y - o f I n d i a n people are not vegetarians, that the quality of meat w h i c h is sold in the market is far below the standard desirable and that a poor country, p a r t i c u l a r l y one w h i c h is bent u p o n economic development, cannot afford the continued wastage of valuable animal products. T h e agitation against the abattoir is nor because the location chosen f o r it is considered unsuitable f r o m social, aesthetic or p u b l i c health p o i n t of view. No one says that the present slaughterhouse at B a n d r a h good enough, w h y bother to disturb i t . The idea of an abattoir comes an a p a i n f u l reminder to the people w h o agitate against it that there are slaughterhouses in the c o u n t r y , however m u c h they may dislike i t , b u t h a v i n g accepted them and got i n u r e d to them, they do not m i n d the filth, the wastage and the cruelty to 'be a n i m a l w h i c h are being slaughtered .today. W h a t they are opposing is something w h i c h is so much better f r o m all other points of view except one. that it w i l l have a bigger capacity than the present slaughterhouse and therefore that i t w i l l mean the k i l l i n g of more animals. T h a t Bombay's p o p u l a t i o n has vastly i n creased since the establishment of the present slaughterhouse in B o m b a y does n o t impress the agitators. Though-there is no basis for i t , the agitation is also f o c u s e d on the possibility of meat p a c k i n g and export of packed meat f r o m the abattoir. No such p r o v i s i o n has actually been made in this project of setting tip a modern slaughterhouse in Devnar. T h e m a i n opposition to the proposal has come f r o m the t r a d i n g c o m m u n i t y both in B o m b a y and A h m e d a h a d . Every trade organisation of any i m p o r t a n c e h i s protested and observed a one-day hartal to register the intensity of its feelings in the matter.