With much fanfare and lofty claims, the Manohar Lal Khattar-led Haryana government released the notification of the Haryana Gauvansh Sanrakshan and Gausamvardhan (HGS and GS) Act in November 2015. It chose the occasion of Gopasthami to officially announce that the anti-cow slaughter act had come into force after president Pranab Mukherjee’s nod.

Under the act, cow trafficking, slaughtering and possessing or consuming beef were prohibited in Haryana. A ban was also imposed on the sale of canned beef (flesh of cow contained in sealed containers) that was legal during the previous state government.

Newspapers called the act “stringent”, “tough” and even “draconian”.

Four years later, the claims turn out to be farcical. It is revealed that of 800 cases filed under the act so far, no accused has been convicted.

The reason? The state government stopped at publicising the act but never cared to frame rules for its implementation. In absence of laid-out rules and training to the police, more than 2000 accused are either out on bail or have been acquitted.

It was only after the Punjab and Haryana High Court lambasted the government earlier this year that things have started moving. In the process, a disturbing picture of the menace of cattle-smuggling in Haryana’s Mewat district, and the police and administration’s helplessness in tackling it has emerged.

Here’s all that the various court hearings and government affidavits say:

Court Pulls Up Police

On March 28, Justice Mahabir Singh Sindhu of the Punjab and Haryana High Court was hearing an anticipatory bail plea of an accused booked under the act. The accused, Israil, had a first information report (FIR) filed against him more than nine months ago at Nuh Police Station in Haryana’s Mewat district (FIR number 432 dated 13 June 2017), but till date, had not been arrested.

Justice Sindhu came down heavily on the police, observing that the court had come across a number of similar cases where accused booked under the HGS and GS Act managed to flee from the spot “despite a secret information to the police prior in time”.

“This shows that there is a complete inaction on the part of the police of District Mewat or deliberately the accused are let to go; or there is a question mark for registration of these cases,” the judge observed, and directed Haryana’s police chief to provide details of all cases registered under the act so far.

‘Zero Conviction Under The Act’

Haryana Director General of Police (DGP) Manoj Yadava submitted the report on 4 April. It said that the police personnel in Mewat are working in a quite hostile atmosphere, facing danger to their life as well as safety.

Close to 800 cases were filed under the act but not even a single person was convicted, it revealed.

The DGP’s report, that compiled data for nearly three years – between the enforcement of the act in November 2015 and 31 March 2019 – said,

A total of 792 FIRs were registered in district Mewat (renamed to Nuh) out of which accused were arrested on the spot in only 96 cases. In rest of the 696 cases, accused managed to escape

A total of 2156 accused were booked under the Act but only 1194 had been arrested. While 236 were arrested on the spot, 958 were arrested later on. In 386 cases, no arrests of the 856 accused were made

Only 13 cases went to court but even then, not even a single person was convicted. As many as 17 got acquitted.

The sorry figures prompted the court to pull up the police. In a 5 April hearing, the court observed,