KARACHI, April 10: As Pakistanis celebrated Eid-ul Azha, the Muslim festival that involves the sacrificing of sheep and goats by those who can afford to do so, police all over the country are in preparation for what can be called the ``battles for the hide''.In 1993, over 20 people were killed in street fights between activists of two political parties over the custody of hides that come off the backs of the sacrificed animals. Since then, this practice has claimed lives in varying degrees.Hide collection has emerged as a big business amongst social welfare organisations, religious groups and political parties in Pakistan. These hides are then bought up by leather industries which use these to make leather items of various types. Pakistan exported over 360 million dollars worth of leather products in 1997 and exports prospects for the current year look even more promising.Leather producers see the Eid-ul Azha festival as a bonanza time for purchases. ``Prices are lower than expected and we get a goodvariety,'' comments Muhammad Muneer, who processes leather products in a factory at Karachi's Korangi Industrial Area. Traders estimate that over 200,000 goats, sheep and cows were sacrificed in Karachi and its suburbs alone. ``This is a big number and we get to pick and choose,'' says the leather processor.Volunteers go around localities in their vans looking for where animals have been slaughtered and convincing the owners to part with the hides. Traditionally, no part of the sacrificed animal can be sold therefore hides have to be given to charity. This is what the volunteers look forward to. Some parties even set up ``Hide collection centres,'' where people can go and give the hides. Leather producers pay over a thousand rupees for a good quality hide. This means windfall profits for those who collect them.For several years, hides were sent to mosques which in turn sold them to run their charity madarasas. In the late eighties, the right wing Jamaat-e-Islami party monopolised the practice. ``Iremember they would come over and pick the hides. Since no one else wanted them, we were happy to give them for a good cause,'' recalls Muhammad Moid, a Karachi resident.However, when the Jamaat-e-Islami party entered mainstream politics and increasingly towards militancy, trends towards giving to social welfare organisations became more popular. Pakistan's most known social worker, Abdus Sattar Edhi, became one of the largest recipients.In 1993, vans of the Edhi Trust were hijacked and the hides collected looted. While Edhi was reluctant to name any one party, observers put the blame on the Jamaat-e-Islami, which was sore over the business it had lost, and local parties like the MQM in Karachi.Police officials now say that the more extremist parties sell hides to raise money for weapons. ``This is big business. It is not a joke,'' says Karachi's police chief. This year, to prepare for Eid-ul Azha, police all over Pakistan had mobile vans on the ready to chase those who looted hides.While therehave been no major incidents so far, police are not taking chances. In Lahore, police is on alert as tensions rise between activists of the Jamaat-e-Islami party and the Muslim Students Federation, the student wing of Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif's PML-N party.Sensing a decline in their fortunes, religious leaders have put out a ``fatwa'' (religious edict) that hides should be given in the ``way of Islam only''. They have also forbidden the practice of giving hides to butchers that come to cut up the sacrificed animals as part of their remuneration. ``It is haraam (forbidden) since the whole of the animal should go to charity,'' says Moulvi Naseem, who adds that this makes the sacrifice ``invalid''. The ``battles for the hide,'' seems to be entering new territory.
