Syed Ali Ahmed | India Tomorrow
NEW DELHI, JULY 21—The slaughter house at Ghazipur in North-East Delhi will open from tomorrow after a sudden closure for four months since the announcement of lockdown by Prime Minister Narendra Modi to check the spread of COVID 19 pandemic in the country.
However, the livestock market attached with the slaughter house was reopened two days ago so that livestock traders can stock animals for slaughtering”, said East Delhi Municipal Corporation (EDMC) mayor Nirmal Jain.
Besides slaughter house and livestock market, all the markets in Delhi including Sadar Bazar, Asia’s biggest wholesale market of general items, Azadpur fruit and vegetable market, Asia’s biggest fruit and vegetable market, Okhla Mandi, Ghazipur Mandi, Keshavpuram Mandi, Shahdara Mandi, Khari Baoli wholesale market for grains, spices, chocolates, chemicals etc, wholesale cloth market in Chandni Chowk, Bhagirath Place which is the wholesale market for medicines, electrical and other items, fish and chicken whole sale market at Ghazipur were opened during ‘unlock 1.0’ that began from July 1.
These markets were reopened during ‘unlock 1.0’ itself despite a number of COVID 19 positive cases were reported in Azadpur fruit and vegetable market, Kharo Baoli and Okhla Mandi.
But neither slaughter house nor the livestock market was allowed to reopen from along with vegetable and fruit wholesale and other markets though no Covid 19 positive cases were reported from among the workers of the slaughter house of livestock market. None of the EDMC officials give any answer to the question as to why the slaughter house and livestock market remained closed so long resulting into huge financials losses to people engaged in rearing of livestock, their trade and their slaughter.
However, Mayor said, “The civic body and the private company, Allana, that runs the slaughter house, had some differences causing delay in reopening of the slaughter house. Now the differences have been sorted out. The slaughter house will function from tomorrow. A trial run of the slaughter house has already been done to examine that machines are functioning well”.
“There might be some technical fault in the machines as they had not been operating for the last five months. But during trial everything was found in order”, the mayor said.
Mayor further said that contract of Allana to run the slaughter house is over now. “The company has been given extension for three-four months. The corporation is inviting new tender in which other companies that have expertise to run the slaughter house will apply. The best company offering cheapest rate will be given contract”, he stated.
It is surprising when a team of India Tomorrow today visited the slaughter house and livestock market to know actual position, the security guards and MCD officials said, “There is no official order to open the slaughter house. Only dead animals are being brought for disposal”. The slaughter house as well as livestock market were closed from inside.
“People involved directly and indirectly in butchering profession – butchers, goat farmers, people in handicraft industry, leather factory and thread made of animal intestine – will take a sigh of relief with opening of slaughter house from tomorrow”, said Delhi Meat Merchant Association president Arshad Qureshi.
Qureshi said the slaughter house supplies meat to around 6000 meat shops in Delhi, army cantonment, hotels located in Delhi.
