Response from Dr Manilal Valliyate of Animal Rahat on the #Jallikattu posts

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Animal Rahat is a sister concern of PETA. Dr Manilal Valliyate heads Animal Rahat and has added the following response to the ongoing discussion (article my me on Jallikattu, Response by Poorva Joshipura, CEO of PETA, my response to that article):

Hi Vidyut,

Apologies for taking this long to get back to you.

Introducing myself, I am a veterinarian who worked for nearly two decades trying to improve the welfare of animals in India, particularly working animals such as horses and cattle, is a son to a farmer and father to a 12 year old boy.

Let me share my perspective as a veterinarian and also a person having some basic understanding about large animal behaviour and welfare. Considering the broad category of animals- prey and predators- I am sure we all will agree that, bulls are prey animals. More than describing whether they are aggressive or docile, what we need to understand is when they are cornered or their movements are restricted, they have to either chose to ‘fight’ or adopt a ‘flight’ behaviour. Usually a fight scenario comes into picture, when they can’t escape from a difficult situation. Otherwise these ruminants would ideally, graze for hours or eat food, lie down and ruminate (chewing the cud- a process of digestion) unless bothered by a predator, which I think some humans are. A bull simply charging at people would be an exceptional situation. Yes, they would do it when they don’t have any other choice of responding to a stimuli of fear, pain or distress. In jallikattu, that’s exactly what people exploit. One of the globally accepted definition of animal welfare mandates, ‘freedom from’ pain, injury, disease, fear and distress so as to achieve reasonable welfare. When we know that jallikattu do not protect the bulls from any of these, there is no point in calling such events as our culture or tradition. Simply because, I don’t think we want our culture and tradition to labelled as ‘cruel’. I have been part of inspections of many jallikattu events from 2011 to 2013 and the bottom line is, one has to induce fear and pain and agitate a bull to push him out of the vadi-vasal (I call it a torture chamber) and face the tamers! Otherwise, if the people around the bull are not causing any harm, the bulls would simply eat, stand or lie down and chew the cud just as mentioned above. Probably, one can easily find such a harmless bull freely wandering in any urban area like Delhi, Lucknow or Noida, not because they chose to be in a chaos of traffic, but simply because they represent the unwanted by-product of the dairy industry abandoned on the roads.

My father was a farmer before he joined the police force in 70s. He still remember the ‘Kalapoottu’ (bull race) competition in Kerala which he had witnessed and was part of. While he used to plough his agricultural field with a pair of bulls he had and he also allowed them to be used for competition during the harvest festival. However, today I don’t think he supports such events anymore. Just because, he came to know more about the animals, the way they feel threatened and feel pain just like we all do. What I know now is he has taken a compassionate stand now based on his own learning of life and he no more support any such events that (ab)use animals.

My son, maybe because of my work and interests, has been watching the debate on jallikattu covered by the media. What I remember is, he telling me- can’t these people see that the bulls are frightened and are running for life and actually are in no mood to “play” with the people? He continues- it doesn’t make any sense at all, when people supporting jallikattu says, there is no cruelty! It’s right in front of you actually! You just need the eyes to see it. For my son, it is simple common sense. He says, people are using stupid excuses to justify their actions. What they need to think is, what if these bulls were actually their sons and daughters left to a mob to manhandle? It is surprising that, some people do claim that the bulls are like their children; but the truth is these children are often send to slaughter when they are useless, except for meat.

Though my views above are more on ethology and ethics, what I would like to emphasise is that, there is a law of the land, enacted in 1960 and under Section 3, it very clearly sates, “It shall be the duty of every person having the care or charge of any animal to take all reasonable measures to ensure the well-being of such animal and to prevent the infliction upon such animal of unnecessary pain or suffering.” There are Rules framed under the same PCA Act which very clearly says what is necessary suffering. But Jallikattu is not part of that exception, so is many other form of cruel animal entertainment. And most importantly why can’t we respect and implement the judgement of the topmost court of the country which ban jallikattu and similar events!  The Apex court has also stated that when culture and tradition are at variance with the law enacted by Parliament, the law takes precedence.

I can also confidentially say that, my arguments above can be scientifically demonstrated and that is what we do exactly at Animal Rahat– a sister organisation of PETA striving to improve the quality of life of working bulls in Maharashtra.

You may print this response, if you find it appropriate and helps the discussion.

Thank you.

Kind regards

Dr Manilal Valliyate

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21 thoughts on “Response from Dr Manilal Valliyate of Animal Rahat on the #Jallikattu posts”

  1. Animal Lovers strongly object Jellikkattu because bulls for this purpose are fostered very well providing nutritious food and secure shelter. This prevents cattle from grazing in open land in hot sun and feeding on dry, scarce leaves and hay. Preventing an animal from grazing in open land in hot sun and preventing its natural instinct of seeking its food is a serious violation of Animal Rights.
    Apart from this, bull enjoys the act of slaughter with sharp knife or being beaten on head. This gives the bull an opportunity for ‘natural’ kill. In Jellikkattu, a bull is denied all these enjoyments and hence, it is to be objected.

  2. Krishan Kumar Kushwaha

    #SaveJallikattu

    To all my TAMIL & NON-TAMIL friends who think that protests going on in Tamilnadu, asking for removal of ban on #Jallikattu, is just a Tamilian issue or just an issue related to a regional sport/tradition, which has been in practice for a long time:

    Before going into details of #Jallikattu i would like to throw some light on bull related issues in other parts of the country so that you would actually understand that this is not just a local issue:

    Current situation in GUJARAT:
    “The state government has decided to import from Brazil 10,000 doses of Gir bull semen as the cow population of this prestigious breed has declined in Gujarat.
    Interestingly, the bulls whose semen are to be imported are descendants of those gifted to Brazil as a goodwill gesture by the maharaja of Bhavnagar before Independence.” http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/city/ahmedabad/Govt-to-import-Gir-bull-semen-from-Brazil/articleshow/50924556.cms

    Situation In KERALA:
    “Vechur Cows contaminated with Jersey and Swiss Brown” because of cross breeding.
    https://naturalfarmerskerala.com/effects-of-visionless-keralas-cattle-breeding-policy/

    Situation in PUNJAB:
    Punjab team to visit Brazil to study Indian cows
    http://indianexpress.com/article/cities/ludhiana/punjab-team-to-visit-brazil-to-study-indigenous-cows/

    Deoni breed cattle of MAHARASHTRA and KARNATAKA in verge of extinction:
    http://www.thehindu.com/todays-paper/tp-national/tp-karnataka/A-new-lease-of-life-for-Deoni-breed-of-cattle/article15243619.ece

    And i can state many such reports to point out that it is a pan India problem.

    Now lets come to #Jallikattu,

    This tradition has been in practice right through the Indus Valley Civilisation:
    http://www.thehindu.com/todays-paper/Bull-baiting-of-yore/article15143051.ece

    Understand the advantage of A2 milk(produced by our native Indian breed cows) over A1 milk(produced by foreign Jersey cows and other cross breed cows with foreign bull’s semen):
    http://food.ndtv.com/food-drinks/a1-versus-a2-milk-does-it-matter-1414225

    Why play with Bull? Jobless people, aren’t they(we)?
    Since only a cow can give milk, obviously every farmer will prefer to have a cow rather than a bull. Wait, now you might ask, bulls can be use for plowing and pulling cart. But unfortunately
    castrated bulls(i,e., Ox) only are used for plowing and pulling cart because they are easy to control. With the invention tractors and transport vehicles even the prospect of plowing and pulling cart has diminished, even if the farmer somehow manages to control the bull.
    So with no use of having a bull at home, why would the farmer feed and grow a bull?So to make some sense of having a bull at home, sports like #Jallikattu, cattle race, etc with cash prices, were introduced. So to prepare the bull for the sport, the farmer takes good care of the bull for the entire year. Byproduct of this is healthy breeding, since only these healthy bulls are used for breeding.

    Okay fine, now why hurt bulls in the name of sport?
    Before you jump into any conclusion, please read the rules of #Jallikattu,
    http://jallikattu.in/?page_id=213

    If at any point of time, a BULL(not the Man playing) is hurt during the event, the event will be called off.
    Note: There are instances where some malpractices(liquor, chilli powder etc.,) took place. We strongly condemn it. After 2008 new govt regulations, every #Jallikattu is conducted in the presence of the district collector and animal welfare board members after receiving a complete health report of the bull from the govt veterinary doctor and medical certificate of the ppl participating in it.

    Hmmm, this seems fine. Why ban #jallikattu then?
    Our diary market is bigger than that of even our sugar market. A country with 1.2 billion ppl in which more than 50% of ppl are vegetarians have to rely heavily on milk for protein.
    Western countries sensed the market opportunities in India.

    Remember that US held the patent rights over Turmeric and pepper?
    http://indiatoday.intoday.in/story/patents-india-wins-a-victory-over-turmeric-but-the-war-is-on/1/277014.html

    Yes this is what exactly they are up to. They want the country with such a huge population to be dependent on them for milk. But patenting milk is now impossible, what next? They came with well crafted idea of mass genocide(yes i call this a genocide.) of Indian breeds. The only way to destroy Indian breed cows is to stop indigenous cow breeding. To stop this they wanted the desi bulls to go extinct.

    They came up with two ideas,
    1. One easy way to do this is strip all the uses of desi bulls from the farmers. Slowly but eventually the farmer has to dump the bulls as he can’t afford to feed them without any economical use. India’s 68% of native breed bulls are with the small farmers who can’t economically afford to feed them without any use.

    2. They lured the farmers with their jersey cows which gives large yield of milk(but of A1 type). Once the jersey cows fully replaces our native breed, we will be fully dependent on the western countries to get the jersey bulls semen for artificial insemination. Now they can dictate terms. They can set the price for semen. We will be now left at their mercy. We too without thinking twice accepted this offer in the name of WHITE REVOLUTION.

    Not just capturing dairy market, medical problems caused by the A1 milk will make us even more dependent on their pharmaceutical industries as well. So they have another economical opportunity.

    Result?
    https://thewire.in/19157/banning-jallikattu-will-decimate-indias-indigenous-cattle-breeds/
    http://www.tehelka.com/2013/01/the-desi-cow-almost-extinct/?singlepage=1

    I tried my best in this post to make some sense as to why traditional cultural activities such as Jallikattu should not be banned.

    Please share this message. Help this message to reach all parts of India. Again, don’t see this as a regional(TAMILIAN) issue.

    #SaveJallikattu #NotJustForTamilnadu

  3. Respected Manilal Valliyate,

    “some people do claim that the bulls are like their children; but the truth is these children are often send to slaughter when they are useless, except for meat”
    Sir, You are doctor you earn more than enough to live a normal/luxury life. But Farmers are not doctors like you to earn more. They are fighting for their daily foods. Then, How can they preserve bulls in their poor situation when they have no need for it?. Just think a situation that you are poor man and you have only one option to save either your son or your lovely bull, which option you will choose. I believe you will obviously save only your son. Its common and unavoidable one. If you say bull, then hats-off, you are equivalent God. But 99% won’t. You must agree on it.

    you say some kind of torture is done during Jallikattu, just consider some things are happening, have you ever seen any kind of torture on remaining 364 days of the year? Can say it? I am damm sure you and every one will have only one answer, Nooooooo.

    Have you ever heard any bull died in jallikattu? But humans will. Then how you can say bull is tortured by human. Useless View.

    This question to every one who say jallikattu harms bull, I could see beef stall in every nook and corner of most of the city, then what the hell slaughter is? Does it give pleasure to bull? What kind of steps you people have taken to stop slaughter of animals(cow,goat,chicken,fish,etc..)?Before stopping slaughter, for what the hell you people come to stop jallikattu?

    Please think by taking your time, if jallikattu is banned, obviously most of the bulls are going to slaughter, it means people like you are the only reason for this slaughter to happen, then how does your ultimate goal to save animals is achieved?

    I have two direct questions to you,
    * don’t you use any leather products? I hope you know where it comes from.
    * don’t you drink milk or milk related stuffs? Please just know, none of the cow comes to human and say please take my milk. Then taking milk from cow without its permission is also an torture.

    If you do either of the above one, I strongly belief you have no right to talk about Jallikattu.

    Sir, I have no intention to harm you. I just wanted you to understand the facts. If any my views harms you, externally Sorry.

  4. Do you know how chickens are raised in a Poultry Farm? How much space they get to live ? Do you know the enormous Cruelty? What about Dairy Farms. Cows are vegetarian? Do you know they are fed non-vegetarian waste. Many such things are fed to them to increase milk yield. Calves are killed, especially male ones, are starved of their mothers’ milk, killed within weeks of their birth. They are on the dining table including those who sermonise on ethical treatment of animals. They are denied natural sex life which is needed to every living being. But they are only treated as money making machines. That too for the foreign multinationals. When the local breeds are destroyed they can make enormous money by exporting semen for insemination. For that they have to somehow make raising bulls unprofitable. Banning Jallikkattu is one such step. Using male calves for the table as veal meat/leather instead of bull for taming. What a great idea, Sir ji. None of the chickens or animals are allowed to live even half of their natural, normal life.

    Has your organization ever filed a PIL against slaughtering of animals slowly bleeding to death in agony. You will never for your organization have no guts to take on such activities/People. You only target the weak, vulnerable and unorganized. I have a doubt that organizations such as PETA targets certain culture and practices so that those culture and practices which bond the people are destroyed with a view to foist alien practices.

    Please ask PETA and other such organizations to reform the People and places they originated from for example Rodeo in US deady bull fight in Spain etc. First ask them to ethically treat dairy animals and birds before any ban on Indian customs.

  5. Hello Dr. Manilal,
    Please remove your dirty before pointing finger to others tradition.

    PETA is treated as Terror group organization at USA and FBI scrutinized https://www.consumerfreedom.com/2015/05/fbi-anti-terror-unit-investigated-peta/
    Peta – an American organisation (Norfolk, Virginia, United States) tells the Supreme Court of India to ban Jallikattu.

    Another American organisation Coca Cola is loosing revenue in their regular soft drinks business, so they enter dairy industry.

    The traditional livestock keepers in TAMILNADU will not be able to maintain the native cattle breeds once the Jallikattu is completely banned.

    Tamil Nadu had six cattle breeds earlier and now we have lost the Alambadi breed. The remaining breeds are Kangayam, Pulikulam, Umbalachery, Barugur and Malai Maadu.

    Slowly we will loose all these breeds…today the MNC’s like Coca Cola and their background supports like PETA have already laid the ground for commercial cattle based diaries and slaughter houses to dominate the country.

    Don’t believe me? Take a look,

    http://m.timesofindia.com/…/Coca-C…/articleshow/50720996.cms

    Coke will invest Rs.28000 crore by 2020 in India (their brand VIO was launched in Feb.2016 through Reliance stores)

    why we need Jallikattu?

    Stud bulls are reared by people for jallikattu. The ones that win are much in demand for servicing the cows. Small farmers cannot afford to keep stud bulls, so each village has a common temple bull which services the cows of the village. Jallikattu is the show where bulls are brought and exhibited. The ones which are most agile (and virile) are preferred by farmers. The calves from such bulls are in demand.

    What is the connection between these events and farming?

    The intricate connect between these events and farming can be seen from the chronological order in which showcase events like jallikattu happen first, then the shandies and then the main farming season starts. Once harvest is done, farmers take their bulls to participate in such events over the next few months; spectators and visitors make a note of the top bulls and seek them out in sandhais(cattle shandies/markets) which happen from December till April all over Tamil Nadu. The calves and bulls are bought for jallikattu and some of their offspring will be castrated and used as draught animals in transport/farming.

    Read more about this here:
    https://thewire.in/19157/banning-jallikattu-will-decimate-indias-indigenous-cattle-breeds/

  6. Banning sport is next think before that why no body even Dr Manilal Valliyate talks about slaughtering of cows in slaughter houses. why cant they ban all slaughter houses if they are so fond of animals. Is there any cruelty than killing a animal. Is sport more cruel than killing for meat?

  7. all this problem came because of some cheap politicians. they allowed PETA inside India. to kill all local Indian breed birds (chicken), animals. PETA persons wear fake mask. India Lossing native breed hen, cow because of white chicken and jerrcy cow that was imported from other country. these white chicken and Jerrcy milk is not good for our health when compare to our breed. PETA are you really care about animals life then first close leather industries, non-veg hotels around India. peta don’t give a image like save animals. peta aim is to kill Indian breed and import foreign breeds inside India and spread disease then send medicine and make money. PETA is not a Indian organization brother and sister. PETA you don’t need to teach how to take care of bulls. we people care bulls around 1000 years. PETA will learn lesson soon. people realize who is PETA, why they came, and what they doing in India

  8. DR.Manilal, You seem to be having some understanding of the bulls.If you are really interested in saving the bulls why can’t you educate the people in preserving and breeding the bulls of Indian origin. I think you can do real constructive work instead of wasting your energy in litigation.

  9. Dr.Manilal Valliyate,

    I do accept your point of view. People causing harm to gain few coins and fame. But do you think a BAN is necessary? At every Olympics we hear and see people who take drugs to enhance performance. Did the western world ban Olympics ??? They brought in regulations and restrictions to make a sport more mature and acceptable. This should be done in India too. Not just with Jalikattu, with every traditional sport we need to regulate and practice. We cant let our tradition pass away to history books. And as an organisation if you say regulating Few village practices is not possible, i believe you as an individual and PeTa as an organisation is purely and totally unfit and incompetent. I am sorry to say but this is the fact.

    And quoting a 12 old kids response for an issue of this size is not a mature thing to do.

    Regards,

    Narendran Kishore

  10. The above argument is baseless and one cannot play with sentiments of region with out thinking. PETA should first preach their base organization to stop killing cows, calf, bulls in overseas where the consumption is too large, every day they eat meat.if the author is taking his son for soft statement, let him take his son to a slaughter house in his region and fight for stopping it…..

  11. Dear Dr Manilal Valliyate, Have you ever raised your voice against killing of animals for eating inside and India and exports to western countries. Does your organisation or PeTA ever stood up and shouted slogan against eating of animals? If you have never done that you or your organisation has no right to shout against a sport. If you people have some shame or have some social responsibility or have real concern about safety of living being you would have done that fist and pushed people across the world and stopped killing of animals for eating. When you have not done that you are just like a joker and and trying to play cheap politics by asking for banning these sports.

  12. Oh poor people!
    I don’t think he is a vertinary doc. Very clearly seen he is head of the sister concern of PETA. Bulls u hv seen on ur states are like broiler chickens. Even the cow of our state will not allow anyone else who grows it, to dare touch it. Then how will a bull react. We r not ready to drink ur jersey a1 milk and hv all the diseases, for u doctors to build bungalows have money beds. Go find some other state for u to thrive on! We still have the Assertive DNA With us becoz of our komadha!

  13. Thinagaran Segran

    DR Manilal Valliyate is just a bull in human form. While he can’t participate in Jallikattu , he also wish other real bulls not to participate.

    The statement above is a summary of article written.

  14. “It shall be the duty of every person having the care or charge of any animal to take all reasonable measures to ensure the well-being of such animal and to prevent the infliction upon such animal of unnecessary pain or suffering.”
    If what ever you have said above is true to your conscience you should ban from killing of animals for whatever purpose they are killed for which would inflict much more pain

  15. Mr Manilal, why don’t you try to bring a ban on vehicles, since there are lot of accidents happening in our day to day life. why don’t you try to bring ban on walking as lots of ants and small insects are killed when we stamp on them. Your comments on cruelty to bulls in jallikattu are similar to that. Then ban you got on jallikattu is because either you don’t know what is the reason of jallikattu or you and your PETA are trying to hide it to serve benefits of some corporate houses who fund you. Please stop spreading false propaganda about jallikattu don’t expect your sponsors will be able to destroy native indian bull breeds and capture the dairy market of india.

  16. Humans cannot survive without consuming life, since life is life in any form you should not consume any organic form.

    Die you malayala asshole

  17. If I agree that animals are abused and you care for it, Can you please ban slaughter houses and killing of animals(beef,chicken,fish,goat etc) for food before stopping the sport where animal is not killed ? I am a vegan who really care for animals. Do what really kills animals and protect what animal/heritage accordingly.

  18. I guess the writer is confused between the ox and a bull. Ox is a castrated bull and less aggressive. Are you sure he is a veterinarian ?

  19. The writer is absolutely right. It’s animal cruelty without a doubt. While I understand why politician supporting the cruelty, some times others like Kamal Hasan, also fall for some stupid traditions that is to be banned.
    Strangely this is India where female part of the animals is supposed to be ‘mother’!
    I have a question to the writer, why you save only bulls? other suffering animals are not in your interest?

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