Goat in Jaffna, Nagadeepa. Presumably not sacrificial.
I saw Mervyn Silva yesterday. He came to escort a child (through the queue) at the Durdan’s OPD. He is a short man, with a high soft voice. He was surrounded by about five thin mustachioed men in dirty white shirts. I guess that’s one side of him. The other is the side that assaults people, steals and God knows what else. Somewhere in between is a man who frees goats.
They sacrifice goats and chickens in Munneswaram, near Chilaw. Hindus do, I mean. Hindu Tamils. Mervyn Silva, the Public Affairs Minister incidentally, swooped, loaded all the animals into trucks and left. There’s more detail in the Sunday Times. It doesn’t mentioned what happened to all the animals.
This move was actually supported by a lot of people I know who are opposed to animal sacrifice. I am, I guess, agnostic on the issue. I don’t think it’s a great thing, but I also eat meat occasionally and I think communities need to change out of these practices themselves. The bigger issue it’s causing in Colombo is that this plus the desecration of a Muslim mosque in Anuradhapura has made the Muslim community edgy. Why Muslims? Because they also sacrifice animals from time to time.
Western Province Governor and Sri Lanka Freedom Party (SLFP) veteran Alavi Moulana warned today that Minister Mervyn Silva would face major problems if he tried to stop the animal sacrifices that will be performed by the Muslim community on the eve of the Haj festival…
Meanwhile Minister Mervyn Silva told a meeting at Kelaniya that anyone who attempted to kill animals would have their hands chopped off. (Daily Mirror)
Mervyn has a knack of popping up at the worst (or best?) moments. At this point the Colombo Mayor’s race essentially turns on the Muslim vote, and there’s had to be a lot of reassuring and communication to calm things down. Milinda Moragoda (who I run social media for) released a Road Map To Address Muslim Issues. AJM Muzammil is Muslim and a bit more insulated.
Anyways, interesting stuff. The Gods must be looking down like, ‘the humans must be crazy’.
Animal sacrifice is pretty barbaric — even more so in Sri Lanka where there are no rules or regulations about humane slaughter. There is no western country that allows its Muslims to slaughter animals randomly on the roads, or in backyards – it has to be done in a certified abbatoir. Can’t they have rules like that in Sri Lanka?