UP meat sellers on strike against Yogi's crackdown, restaurants to be hit

Operations have been disrupted completely for the past few days because of an atmosphere of fear

Meat sellers across Uttar Pradesh (UP) launched an indefinite strike from Monday against the Yogi Adityanath government's crackdown on illegal and mechanised slaughterhouses.

"We have decided to intensify our strike from tomorrow. All shops will remain closed. Fish sellers too have joined us and are extending support to us," Lucknow Bakra Gosht Vypar Mandal office bearer Mubeen Qureshi had said on Sunday.

He said, in the wake of the crackdown, there was no question of the strike being called off anytime soon. "It will go on indefinitely," he added.

Industry fears being butchered

Several butcher shops and slaughterhouses across the state have complained that they are being targeted under the new dispensation. “Authorities are even closing down chicken shops,” a shop owner in Noida told NDTV. Another said even legal abattoirs were asked to hang curtains in front of their stores, while others alleged that the new administration was not willing to issue fresh licenses or renew the old ones.

Meat ban to Anti-romeo squad: Yogi Adityanath's governance model for UP

As reported earlier, operations have been disrupted completely for the past few days because of an atmosphere of fear across the supply chain, since the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) formed the government in the state after winning a historic mandate, with Yogi Adityanath as chief minister. One of the party’s election promises was shutting down illegal slaughterhouses.

So far, allegedly illegal meat shops have been shut down in Lucknow, Varanasi and Ghaziabad. Last week, three meat shops owned by Muslims were burned down in Hathras.

Eateries hit

Due to the strike, non-vegetarian food outlets, including the famous Tunday and Rahim's have shifted to mutton and chicken dishes after buffalo meat became scarce.

As the mouth-watering kebabs went off the platter, the owner of another famous eatery said the situation might force hoteliers to get mutton from Delhi. "But there will be no compromise on the quality of the food," he said, speaking on condition of anonymity. Read More

Modi's message after Yogi Adityanath's elevation as UP CM- Hindus will rule

Adityanath has in the past accused Muslim men of waging 'love jihad'

A saffron-robed Hindu holy man was sworn in on Sunday to lead Uttar Pradesh, sealing what appears to be a shift in course by Prime Minister Narendra Modi that could redefine the world's largest democracy as a Hindu nation.

The choice as Uttar Pradesh chief minister of Yogi Adityanath, a firebrand Hindu ascetic with a history of agitation against minority Muslims, stunned observers who said it marked a departure from the platform of development for all on which Modi rose to national power in 2014.

"Modi is saying India is a Hindu country and shall remain so," veteran journalist and commentator Shekhar Gupta told Reuters.

"Hindus will rule, so you had better behave."

A spokesman for Modi's Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) however said the government did not make any distinction between citizens on the basis of religion.

Adityanath, 44, was elected by state lawmakers on Saturday, a week after the BJP won a landslide victory in India's most populous state by mobilising the Hindu vote. The BJP won the biggest majority for any party in the state legislature in 40 years.

He took the oath of office at an open-air ceremony in the state capital Lucknow on Sunday, before shaking hands with Modi and other BJP elders who attended.

After the ceremony, Modi said in a tweet: "Our sole mission and motive is development. When UP develops, India develops."

The BJP fielded no candidates from the Muslim minority that makes up 19 percent of the population in a state with a population of 220 million that is home to 15 percent of the world's poor. If it were a country, Uttar Pradesh would be the world's fifth-most populous.

India's 1.3 billion people are about 80 percent Hindu and 14 percent Muslim, with the rest made up of Christians, Sikhs and other minorities. It is officially a secular nation, but the BJP has for years fought elections on a Hindu nationalist agenda, with party members in the past being accused of making anti-Muslim statements to polarise Hindu voters. Read Full Story >>>

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