Beauty Without Cruelty-India exposes Gadhi Mai scam

Multi-year investigation

PUNE, India––Gullible opponents of the Gadhi Mai mass sacrifice in Nepal have inadvertently helped the priests behind it to scam some of the poorest people in the world, a multi-year investigation by Beauty Without Cruelty India has discovered.

Held approximately every five years in Bariyarpur, Nepal, 26 kilometers from the border with Bihar state, India, the Gadhi Mai sacrificial festival at peak verifiably involved the decapitation of as many as 2,500 buffalo, plus several hundred smaller animals. About 750 buffalo, plus lesser numbers of smaller animals, were slaughtered at the 2014 Gadhi Mai festival, in honor of the local goddess Gadhi Mai.

But the Gadhi Mai festival has been touted by both the promoters and protesters as involving tens of thousands of buffalo and more than 100,000 animals altogether. The promoters benefit when protesters amplify claims that exaggerated numbers are killed.

Same animals sold several times

“Persistent inquiries revealed that the temple authorities take money from devotees for the animals promising to arrange for the sacrifice,” BWC-India found. “For an animal to be sacrificed, one devotee may give 1,000 rupees or less, whereas another may give 3,000 and yet another 5,000. Thus the temple records show scores more than are actually sacrificed. People who wish to sacrifice may not even see the animal…Once they have paid they think their reverence to the goddess is over.”

Buffalo calf rescued by the Visakha SPCA. (VSPCA photo)

Buffalo calf rescued by the Visakha SPCA. (Eileen Weintraub photo)

Bihar per capita income is currently about $133 per person per year. This is about three times the current $42 per capita income of rural residents of the Tarai, the region of Nepal bordering Bihar.

If Bihar and Bara rural people donate 2,000 buffalo to be sacrificed during the Gadhi Mai festival, a region in which healthy adult buffalo have a sale value of $500 apiece or more, they may be donating at least $1 million worth of animals. The economic impact on the region of killing 2,000 buffalo, at per capita income of $133/year, would be equal to the annual income of 7,519 people on the Bihar side of the border; 23,809 people on the Bara side.

If half of the economic value of the buffalo is wasted, as reports of many carcasses being buried in mass graves indicate, the wastage alone is equal to the annual incomes of up to 12,000 people.

Surplus from dairy industry

But the BWC-India investigators believe the buffalo sacrificed at Gadhi Mai festival are well short of reaching full adult value.

“Repeated close scrutiny of scores of photographs and videos revealed that almost all the buffaloes were male calves––obviously unwanted animals from the dairies of the region,” BWC-India reported. “Since it is not economical for milk producers to rear young male buffalo calves, they have no qualms whatsoever in selling them off for sacrifice.”

The BWC-India findings appear in “Unraveling Gadhi Mai,” the lead article in the Spring 2015 edition of the BWC-India magazine Compassionate Friend. The article is co-authored by Diana Ratnagar, managing trustee of BWC-India since 1974, and BWC-India trustee Rajeev Sethi.

(See www.bwcindia.org/Web/QuarterlyJournal/2015/Compassionate%20Friend%20Spring%202015%20Vol%20XXXVIII%20No%201.pdf.)

Overview of the 2014 Gadhi Mai sacrificial festival at Bariyarpur, Nepal. This is the Humane Society International drone photo, with enumeration by ANIMALS 24-7 editor Merritt Clifton.

“Over-estimation”

Becoming aware of the Gadhi Mai sacrificial festival ahead of the 2009 event, and learning that most of the animals killed and human participants come from Bihar, India, BWC-India in 2009 “approached the Union Minister of Home Affairs to ban the movement of animals across the Indo-Nepal border. The government deployed an additional 4,500 Sashastra Seel Bal (SSB) officials at the border outposts,” Ratnagar and Sethi wrote.

“According to a senior SSB officer the number of animals sacrificed from India in 2009 was reduced by 75%. But, in view of only a few hundred being seized and maybe as many apprehended from crossing over, BWC felt it was an over-estimation,” Ratnagar and Sethi continued.

“Our meticulous investigations about the Gadhi Mai animal sacrifice threw up some significant information. But, it was only after the November 2014 sacrifice that we came to know we were not the only ones to have realized the 2009 figures had been highly exaggerated.”

“Each life is precious”

ANIMALS 24-7 in April, October, and November 2014 published investigative reports similarly concluding that both the Gadhi Mai priests and campaigners against the Gadhi Mai sacrifices were claiming figures inflated by more than a hundredfold. But until the ANIMALS 24-7 findings were combined with those of BWC-India, it was not clear that the origin of the exaggerations might have been the practice of Gadhi Mai priests selling the lives of the same animals to different devotees many times over.

The Spring 2015 edition of Compassionate Friend also includes a summary of the ANIMALS 24-7 findings.

Beth & Merritt Clifton.
(Geoff Geiger photo)

Concluded Ratnagar and Sethi, “Knowing the number of animals killed is lesser than thought does not make it any the less barbaric, cruel, or gruesome. Every animal is an individual and each life is precious and counts.”

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Sharon Yildiz says

February 3, 2015 at 3:14 pm

Very interesting article. I lived in Istanbul for 5 years. Muslims have a holiday called the “Feast of Sacrifice,” that is similar in most ways to the U.S. Thanksgiving. (Clean the house, friends/family come for a big dinner, etc.) In the past and in rural areas today, people would have bought a live animal and slaughtered it in the street or on a rooftop. Today, you go to the French version of Super-Walmart (called “Carrefour”) and buy a lamb, or a share of lamb or cow. A bunch of families that don’t know each other can buy a share of the same cow. However, unlike Ghadi Mai, the financial dealings are ethical. The sheep or cow is, however, quite marked up in price. For example, a sheep in the U.S. is worth about $100-150, I believe. There, they may sell five shares @ $50. Anyway, you are given a ticket to pick up your share.

On the sacrifice day, Carrefour sets up a portable abattoir in their parking lot. The live animals are corralled in a private area with a tent. There is a fenced corridor leading to the abattoir building, which has no front wall. Families, including kids, stand behind a small barricade and watch “their” animal being walked from the corral to the abattoir. Some very skilled people handle the animals as humanely as possible, slit the animal’s throat, and the animal is laid beside other bleeding animals to bleed into a grating. After each animal is dead, a small group of butchers skin it and sort the meat into the “share” bags. The sheep and bags are numbered, so the family just comes forward to get their plastic shopping bag full o’ meat when their number is called.

Traditionally, the family is supposed to give 1/3 of the meat to themselves, 1/3 to a neighbor, and 1/3 to the poor. In practice, if they get a small share, they eat it themselves. Wealthy people that buy a whole sheep put 1/3 of their share in a refrigerated truck, standing by, to be taken to some charity like a hospital, nursing home, etc.

I moved to Istanbul right after having been vegetarian for 20 years. At first, I was shocked to see these animals being killed and butchered in public, while families watched. (Somberly, I might add). After a couple years of seeing it, I started wishing Americans would do something like this. First of all, every animal used came from a regular family farm. As far as I know, sheep cannot be factory farmed, and cattle in Turkey are all grass fed on small farms. Second, the slaughter part is out in the open under a LOT of scrutiny. The guys are not unskilled workers getting paid to go quickly, but very skilled at the gentle and calm handling of animals. I did not see any struggling, vocalization, etc. In fact, it was almost impossible to see the point at which the blade was used. The animal walks in and is being petted, and the next thing you know, it’s lying over a grate, bleeding. Compare this to the horrible U.S. slaighterhouse footage we see of animals being beaten, cattle-prodded, cut up while still alive, etc. And third, these people SEE where their meat is coming from. It is not a sanitized plastic-wrapped styrofoam tray in the meat dept. of a grocery store.

I was disgusted to hear that some of the Ghadi Mai animals wind up buried in a pit without even being eaten. However, I am glad that the numbers are at least orders of magnitude less that people thought.

Comments

Sharon Yildiz says
February 3, 2015 at 3:14 pm
Very interesting article. I lived in Istanbul for 5 years. Muslims have a holiday called the “Feast of Sacrifice,” that is similar in most ways to the U.S. Thanksgiving. (Clean the house, friends/family come for a big dinner, etc.) In the past and in rural areas today, people would have bought a live animal and slaughtered it in the street or on a rooftop. Today, you go to the French version of Super-Walmart (called “Carrefour”) and buy a lamb, or a share of lamb or cow. A bunch of families that don’t know each other can buy a share of the same cow. However, unlike Ghadi Mai, the financial dealings are ethical. The sheep or cow is, however, quite marked up in price. For example, a sheep in the U.S. is worth about $100-150, I believe. There, they may sell five shares @ $50. Anyway, you are given a ticket to pick up your share.
On the sacrifice day, Carrefour sets up a portable abattoir in their parking lot. The live animals are corralled in a private area with a tent. There is a fenced corridor leading to the abattoir building, which has no front wall. Families, including kids, stand behind a small barricade and watch “their” animal being walked from the corral to the abattoir. Some very skilled people handle the animals as humanely as possible, slit the animal’s throat, and the animal is laid beside other bleeding animals to bleed into a grating. After each animal is dead, a small group of butchers skin it and sort the meat into the “share” bags. The sheep and bags are numbered, so the family just comes forward to get their plastic shopping bag full o’ meat when their number is called.
Traditionally, the family is supposed to give 1/3 of the meat to themselves, 1/3 to a neighbor, and 1/3 to the poor. In practice, if they get a small share, they eat it themselves. Wealthy people that buy a whole sheep put 1/3 of their share in a refrigerated truck, standing by, to be taken to some charity like a hospital, nursing home, etc.
I moved to Istanbul right after having been vegetarian for 20 years. At first, I was shocked to see these animals being killed and butchered in public, while families watched. (Somberly, I might add). After a couple years of seeing it, I started wishing Americans would do something like this. First of all, every animal used came from a regular family farm. As far as I know, sheep cannot be factory farmed, and cattle in Turkey are all grass fed on small farms. Second, the slaughter part is out in the open under a LOT of scrutiny. The guys are not unskilled workers getting paid to go quickly, but very skilled at the gentle and calm handling of animals. I did not see any struggling, vocalization, etc. In fact, it was almost impossible to see the point at which the blade was used. The animal walks in and is being petted, and the next thing you know, it’s lying over a grate, bleeding. Compare this to the horrible U.S. slaighterhouse footage we see of animals being beaten, cattle-prodded, cut up while still alive, etc. And third, these people SEE where their meat is coming from. It is not a sanitized plastic-wrapped styrofoam tray in the meat dept. of a grocery store.
I was disgusted to hear that some of the Ghadi Mai animals wind up buried in a pit without even being eaten. However, I am glad that the numbers are at least orders of magnitude less that people thought.
- jmuhj says
  February 3, 2015 at 7:38 pm
  Thanking you so very much for sharing your experience and observation with us. May others gain knowledge and understanding from them. Incidentally, the animal is not supposed to ever see the knife, and the whole reason for halal slaughter originated directly out of the requirement to be humane and kind.
jmuhj says
February 3, 2015 at 7:39 pm
Thanking you for a very important article with vast implications on so many levels not limited to animal welfare. Sharing to social media, with that hope and *PRAYER*.
JG says
February 10, 2015 at 10:22 am
Excellent investigative reporting!