After tragedy, irony: temple runs a pound, auctions dead cows

The temple committee issues annual tenders for the clearing of dead cattle and the award goes to the highest bidder. The contract is considered quite a prize in the local trade and is fairly lucrative by mofussil standards; often, more than a dozen parties contest.

Last year, the bid went to Shivdayal or Shibu Thekedar, as he is known, cobbler by caste and raw leather dealer by occupation, who offered an average of Rs 600 per carcass.

Shibu Thekedar was one of those who loaded the dead cow onto the truck in front of his tannery before seeing it off on its unfortunate journey. And the family Ratan Singh, father of Virender Singh, one of those killed by the mob, has long been known to him for they ply the same trade. ‘‘The cow was dead, I have sworn on affidavit, it was old and ailing and lame,’’ Shibu Thekhdar said, ‘‘There is no need for us to kill them because there are enough dying all the time and skinning them is just and fair even according to the temple people.’’

‘‘Nobody really wants or cares for the cows and oxen we keep, which is why they come here,’’ says Mahipal Singh, the temple committee’s munshi. ‘‘And when they are dead they are really of no use. We earn some money auctioning them and the leather traders earn their own profits.’’

The cattle are lodged in a half-acre enclosure within the temple complex. There are close to 800 cows at the moment, a few of them close to dying. The pen is overcrowded; underfed cows goading and kicking about like unruly prisoners in an open jailyard. The cattle-pound is, according to the munshi, a ‘‘dharmarth yatn,’’ an effort in the interests of faith.

The cows are maintained by the temple committee so they can die ‘‘naturally and peacefully.’’ But the conditions they exist in are neither peaceful nor natural. Says the munshi: ‘‘We are forever short of fodder and manpower to maintain them. An average 300-350 cows die each year and are given away to contractors. But I don’t know what will happen with this new furore over the killing of Dalits, there is some fear in the area, the cobblers may not come to pick up dead cattle too easily.’’

The Farukhpur temple is barely 5 km from Dulina, the site of the Dalits’ murder and the road to Munshi Mahipal Singh’s office in the Hanuman temple complex follows a simple enough trail: the route cows take once they have turned deadweight, which is, once they have stopped milching and breeding, or, once they have become useless under the yoke.

‘‘We are not involved in anything illegal, and yet we are being made to feel like criminals,’’ says Shivdayal. ‘‘I have a copy of the contract I earned, it is the temple goshala (cattleshed) I get most of my raw material from. This has happened for ages, now suddenly a hue and cry is being raised over nothing.’’

Since the Jhajjar lynching, Shibu and his team of 50-odd workers have been too afraid even to open their ramshackle little tanning shed in the backlanes of the Farukhpur bazaar. And though cattle have been dying in the villages around, nobody has gone out to pick them.

‘‘Who will go out risking death?’’ asked Shibu, ‘‘Going to lift a dead cow, going out to do our legitimate business has become an invitation to death.’’