KATHMANDU — It is well known that the Federation of Animal Welfare Nepal (FAWN) has been campaigning to end the mass animal sacrifice in Gadhimai Festival since its establishment. “Bloodless Gadhimai” – sacrifice blind faith, not animals, slogan was carried throughout the campaign, and different activities were organized in local area of Bara, Parsa and Rautahat district, India-Nepal border, provincial-level activities in State 2 and also in Central level to discourage the animal sacrifice aiming to stop the mass killing in Gadhimai festival. The campaign “Bloodless Gadhimai” is supported by the Humane Society International.
FAWN was hopeful for the positive results from the campaign after considering the Supreme Court decision to discourage the ritual animal sacrifice in Nepal where the court directed Nepal Government bodies to take action to curb the animal sacrifice in the Gadhimai festival by bearing in mind the cultural sensitivity of the people.
FAWN partnered with different local organizations on the ground to implement the campaign activities including patrolling India-Nepal border to control animal movement and coordinated with the Department of Livestock Services, Maha Gadhimai Municipality, Festival Management Main Committee and District Administration Office of Bara where these government bodies committed to acting to discourage the animal sacrifice during the festival. After a series of efforts by FAWN, pre-festival decisions made by the committee was progressive where they made a written commitment not to sacrifice buffalo calves on the event, introducing Pigeon conservation program under the leadership of Mayor of Maha Gadhimai municipality, and supporting the Bloodless Gadhimai campaign in different local media as well.
Despite all these efforts from FAWN, this year, bloodbath took place on the 3rd of December were around 200 unlicensed butchers slaughtered the buffaloes, including the calves in the slaughter arena of 13735 sq. m. which is around 200m from the temple. Butchers dramatically entered the arena and started the slaughter which continued for almost 5 hours. We are very much saddened to encounter this barbaric act in the 21st century where the century-old tradition of pleasing the goddess by forgoing other sentient beings surpasses the humane ideology of preventing cruelty. The post sacrifice head counting of dead buffaloes inside the arena carried by FAWN team members concluded with approximately 4000 buffaloes and tens of thousands of other small animals, especially goats and chickens. Regardless of all the promises made by those government bodies along with the Festival Management Main Committee, they all decided to continue the inhumane massacre and failed to keep the promises they made including protecting the buffalo calves. FAWN strictly condemns this brutal ritual massacre, which firmly challenged the verdict of the Supreme Court.
FAWN will continue the anti-animal sacrifice campaign in the coming days and will extend to aware the people on different levels aiming to stop ritual killings and make the upcoming Gadhimai festival 2024 bloodless in real sense.
