Mira Bhayandar: Sleuths of the Kashigaon police have registered an offence against three people for participating in an illegally organised horse-cart racing competition on 1, October. The action followed after the intervention of volunteers attached to the People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals (PETA) India who had received information about the horse-cart race.
About The Interception
On duty police personnel from the Kashimira police station swiftly set up barricades at strategic locations and intercepted two horse carts while they were crossing the Versova bridge on the highway in Kashimira a little past midnight. The riders who were identified as-Owen Dennis DeMello (26) and Roncy Peter Kaltil (36) who were accosted to the police station confessed to have organised the race from Uttan village to Versova bridge sans permission on occasion of Urus Yatra-an annual festival which is observed in Uttan. The police team intercepted another horse-cart and apprehended its rider-Benny Pereira (40) near Neelkamal junction.
The race involved several men whipping and beating horses to force them to race amidst the vehicle traffic and chaos created by shouting riders. While all the six horses were sent for medical examinations to the Pashu Ashram-an animal rescue centre and shelter home run by the Shri Mumbai Jeev Daya Mandli located in Dhekale village near Sakwar in Vasai, the trio were booked under the relevant sections of the Bhartiya Nyay Sanhita (BNS) which address acts done by several persons with common intention, rash driving on public way and negligent conduct with respect to animals and endangering life or personal safety of others.
This apart from slapping sections 11(1)(a) and 11(1) of the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals Act, 1960 which pertains to treating animals cruelly and conveying or carrying animals in a cruel manner.
“While reports of the medical examinations of the horses are awaited, the trio were let-off after being served with notices.” said a police official. Such kind of cart races which result in exploitation and cruelty to horses has been banned by the judiciary.
