Meat seized from house of ragpicker lynched by cow vigilantes wasn’t beef: Lab report

ROHTAK: The meat seized from the house of a 26-year-old ragpicker, who was killed by cow vigilantes on suspicion that he had eaten cow meat in Charkhi Dadri’s Badhra area, was not beef, according to the forensic report submitted to the Haryana police.

Badhra deputy superintendent of police (DSP) Bharat Bhushan said Sabir Malik and his aide Aseeruddin were thrashed by a group of cow vigilantes on August 27 on suspicion that they had consumed beef. Malik died due to the injuries sustained in the attack.

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“We had seized meat from their shanties in Hansawas village and sent it to Faridabad laboratory to confirm whether they had eaten beef or not. We have just received the report which has confirmed that there was no beef and allegations levelled by the cow vigilantes are not true,” Bharat Bhushan said.

The DSP said 10 people had been arrested in the case and six people were still on the run. “Soon, we will submit the charge sheet in court, and we will attach the laboratory report,” he added.

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Sabir Malik lived with his wife Shakina Malik and their two-year-old daughter in Hansawas Khurd village. She and two other families from South 24 Parganas in West Bengal have returned to their native village after the deadly attack.

In his police complaint, Malik’s brother-in-law Surajuddin Sarkar said three men had visited their shanties on August 27 afternoon, asking Sabir to come along. “They assaulted him near the Badhra bus stand and later took him to another place. Earlier in the day, police had called my father and me to Badhra police station and we told them that we had not consumed beef. Then, my sister called me and said that Sabir had not returned. We informed the police and my brother-in-law was found dead the same evening,” he said after Malik’s death.

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Days after his death, Haryana chief minister Nayab Singh Saini condemned the incident but defended the state’s stance on cow protection.

“Mob lynching is not right, but people from villages react when such incidents [purported beef consumption] come to light,” Saini said on August 31. “We have enacted a strict law in the state assembly for the protection of cows and there is no compromise on it,” he said, after stating that “cows are revered in the villages here and when people hear about such things, who can prevent what happens”.