NEW DELHI: The Supreme Court on Thursday reserved verdict on pleas challenging the amended laws that allow jallikattu and bullock cart races in Tamil Nadu, Karnataka and Maharashtra. The pleas were heard by a five judge bench of justices KM Joseph, Ajay Rastogi, Aniruddha Bose, Hrishikesh Roy and CT Ravi Kumar.
The supreme court, in 2018, had referred the case to the five-judge bench to decide whether the people of TN and Maharashtra could conserve jallikattu and bullock-cart races as their cultural right and demand their protection under Article 29 (1) of the Constitution.
The bench had formulated five questions which were to be decided by the constitution bench one of which was whether the 2017 jallikattu and bullock cart races laws of TN and Maharashtra subserved the objective of “prevention” of cruelty to animals under the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals Act of 1960. It has been argued by the petitioners that just because a group of citizens say it’s a culture, it cannot be said so.
Senior Advocate Shyam Divan for the petitioners argued the rules which regulated jalkikattu are an “eyewash”. Defending the law, Tamil Nadu argued that the top court can suggest changes to the rules and standard of procedures (SOPs) but cannot read down the law allowing jallikattu.