Nagpur: In a new deceitful strategy, butchers in North Nagpur have started conducting their illegal cow slaughter operations from their homes instead of slaughterhouses, to dodge police action. Despite these efforts, Pachpaoli Police successfully raided a house in Azad Nagar, New Vasti Teka, on Wednesday. They rescued 11 bovines and arrested the mastermind, Riyaz Ahmed alias Abdul Rehman Qureshi, a report in a local daily said.
In a follow-up raid on Thursday, police targeted the residence of Iqbal Ahmed Qureshi in the same area, rescuing another four bovines that were about to be slaughtered.
Today’s Rate
Thursday 21 Nov. 2024
With the ongoing Ganesh festival and the approaching State Assembly elections, police have intensified their vigilance on cattle smugglers and right-wing cow vigilante groups to prevent clashes. These groups have previously caused riot-like tensions in the area.
A team led by Senior Inspector Baburao Raut from Pachpaoli Police Station seized sharp cutting tools and weighing machines from Qureshi’s residence. Since police have conducted 15-16 raids on illegal slaughterhouses, butchers have begun operating from their homes to avoid detection. Following a tip-off, police kept a close watch on Qureshi’s house before executing the raid.
According to the report, the butchers are using concealed spaces within their homes to hide the bovines, often keeping them in terraces, small cabins, or even bathrooms under horrible conditions. This tactic helps them avoid being caught by informers, who often provide police with crucial information. In this case, head constable Gnyaneshwar Bhoge led surveillance on Ahmed’s residence, which resulted in the successful raid.
Police also revealed that the butchers are utilizing hidden spaces, such as behind bathrooms or kitchens, to conceal the animals and carry out the slaughter. These illegal activities have forced butchers to adopt increasingly secretive methods.
Nagpur butchers typically source bovines from remote villages or cow markets along the Maharashtra-Madhya Pradesh border, such as in Gondia, transporting them to Nagpur via Bhandara. Additionally, cattle smugglers bring bovines from neighbouring states like Madhya Pradesh, Haryana, Uttar Pradesh, Chhattisgarh, Jharkhand, Telangana, and Andhra Pradesh.
Apart from Nagpur, these bovines are also transported to other districts, including Amravati, Yavatmal, Akola, and Buldhana. In Nagpur, the smuggling syndicate is concentrated in North Nagpur, Kamptee, and Mominpura. Notably, cattle smugglers from Mominpura have also been linked to a major incident in Madhya Pradesh, where bovine carcasses were thrown into a river, causing communal tensions.
