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Organisation 48. The State shall endeavour of agriculture and to organise agriculture 'and animal husbandry. animal husbandry oil modern and scientific lines and shall, in parti-
cular, take steps for preserving and improving the breeds, and prohibiting the slaughter, of cows and calves and other milch and draught cattle."
The principal purpose of this article, according to learned counsel for the petitioners, is to direct the ,State to endeavour to organise agriculture and animal husbandry on modern and scientific lines and the rest of the provisions of that article are ancillary to this principal purpose. They contend that the States are required to take steps for preserving and improving the breeds and for prohibiting the slaughter of the animals specified therein only with a view to implement that principal purpose, that is to say, only as parts of the general scheme for organising our agriculture and animal husbandry on modern and scientific lines. Learned counsel for the petitioners refer to the marginal note to Art. 48 in support of their contention on this part of the case. They also rely on entry 15 in List II of the Seventh Schedule to the Constitution. That entry reads: " Preservation, protection and improvement of stock and prevention of animal diseases; veterinary training and practice." There is no separate legislative head for prohibition of slaughter of animals and that fact, they claim, lends support to their conclusion that the prohibition of the slaughter of animals specified in the last part of Art. 48 is only ancillary to the principal directions for preservation, protection and improvement of stock, which is what is meant by organising agriculture and animal husbandry. Learned counsel for the respondents and Pandit Thakurdas Bhargava, who appears as amicus cutriae, on the other hand, maintain that the article contains three distinct and separate directions, each of which should, they urge, be implemented independently -and as a separate charge. It is not necessary for us, on this occasion, to express a final opinion on this question. Suffice it to say that there is no conflict between the different parts of this article and indeed the two last directives for preserving and improving the breeds and for the prohibition of slaughter of certain specified animals represent, as is indicated by the words " in particular ", two special aspects of the preceding general directive for organising agriculture and animal husbandry on modern and scientific lines. Whether the last two directives are ancillary to the first as contended for by learned counsel for the peti- tioners or are separate and independent items of directives as claimed by counsel on the other side, the directive for taking steps for preventing the slaughter of the animals is quite explicit and positive and contemplates a ban on the slaughter of the several categories of animals specified therein, namely, cows and calves and other cattle which answer the description of milch or draught cattle. The protection recommended by this part of the directive is, in our opinion, confined only to cows and calves and to those animals which are presently or potentially capable of yielding milk or of doing work as draught cattle but does not, from the very nature of the purpose for which it is obviously recommended, extend to cattle which at one time were milch or draught cattle but which have ceased to be such. It is pursuant to these directive principles and in exercise of the powers conferred by Arts. 245 and 246 of the Constitution read with entry 15 in List 11 of the Seventh Schedule thereto that the, Legislatures of Bihar, Uttar Pradesh and Madhya, Pradesh have respectively enacted the statutes which are challenged as unconstitutional. In order properly, to appreciate the meaning and scope of the impugned Acts it has to be borne in mind that each one of those Acts is a law with respect to " preservation, protection and improvement of stock ", and their constitutional validity will have to be judged in that context and against that background. Keeping this consideration in view, we proceed now to examine the relevant provisions of the three Acts.

The C. P. and Berar Act of 1949 was originally intituled "

An Act to provide for preservation of certain animals by controlling the slaughter thereof," and the preamble recited that it was " expedient to provide for the preservation of certain animals by controlling the slaughter thereof."

,Animal " was defined in s. 2 as meaning an animal specified in the schedule. The schedule specified the following categories of animals, namely, (1) bulls, (2) bullocks, (3) cows, (4) calves, (5) male and female buffaloes and (6) buffalo calves. Section 4 originally prohibited the slaughter of an " animal " without certificate. There was then no total ban on the slaughter of any animal as defined. ,In 1951, the C. P. and Berar Animal Preservation Act, 1949, was amended by the Madhya Pradesh Act XXIII of 1951. By this amending Act the words, " by prohibiting or " were added to the long title and the preamble before the word "

The Report of the Cattle Preservation and Development Committee did not recommend the immediate total ban on the slaughter of all cattle. They recommended the establishment of concentration camps, later on euphemistically called Gosadans, and though total ban was the ultimate objective, it did not, for the moment, prohibit the slaughter of animals over the age of 14 years and of animals of any age permanently unfit for work or breeding owing, to age or, deformity. In para. 134 of the Expert Committee's Report at, p. 63 it, is stated clearly that the total ban on the slaughter of all cattle would not be in the best interests of the country as it is merely a negative and not a positive approach to the problem. They consider that a constructive approach to the problem will be, to see that no useful animal is slaughtered and that the country's. resources are fully harnessed to produce better and more efficient cattle. Neither the First Five Year Plan nor -the Second Five Year Plan accepted the idea of a total ban on the slaughter of cattle. Indeed, according to the Second Five Year Plan, a total ban will help the tendency for the number of surplus cattle to increase and, in their view, a total ban on the slaughter of all cows, calves and other milch and draught cattle will defeat the very object of the directive principles embodied in Art. 48 of the Constitution. We find from para. 6 on p. 283 of the Second Five Year Plan that the Gosadan scheme did not make any, real or satisfactory progress and that altogether 22 Gosadans housing only 8,000 cattle had been established by the States up to the date of that document and even then many of the States had encountered difficulty in, securing the areas of land needed for their; operations. The Planning Commission considered that it would be impossible to establish enough of these Gosadans and they reached the conclusion that in defining the scope. of the ban on the slaughter of cattle the States should take a, realistic view of the fodder resources available in the country. and the extent to which they can get the. co-operation of voluntary organisations to bear the main responsibility for, maintaining unserviceable, and unproductive cattle with a measure of assistance from the Goverment land general support from; the people., As already stated,' the, Memorandum on Human Nutrition vis-a-vis, Animal. Nutrition at p. 4 expressed the view that the Gosadan scheme can, serve only a limited purpose and, if extended countrywide was likely, to hinder, rather than help the problem of disposing of the, surplus animals, appart From the huge initial cost. A, large, concentration of useless animals within a restricted area, the authors of that Memorandum feared, might lead to considerable soil erosion due to overgrazing and there might be every possibility of contagious and parasitic diseases spreading from these animals to the surrounding area. It is only the Gosamvardan Enquiry Committee which had recommended an immediate total ban on the slaughter of all cattle, irrespective of age or sex. It should, however, be noted that even that Committee did not recommend such a total ban as a measure independent of all other considerations. Its recommendation in this behalf was linked up with and was a part of a scheme which depended, for its success, on a variety of imponderable matters, like public enthusiasm and support for the establishment and maintenance of Gosadans in a high state of working, efficiency, the capacity of the State to bring more lands under cultivation, reclamation of the jungle lands and the like. It may be noted also that although in some of the States total ban has been imposed on the slaughter of cattle, many of the States have not con- sidered it necessary to impose such a blanket ban. Thus the Assam Cattle Protection Act, 1950, the Bombay Animal Preservation Act, 1948, the West Bengal Animal Slaughter Control Act, 1950, the Hyderabad Slaughter of Animal Act, 1950, the Travancore-Cochin Notification permit slaughter of cattle and buffaloes over specified years of age. Even the Madhya Pradesh Act, as criminally enacted, did not place a total ban on the slaughter of all cattle.

The next question is as to what should be the scope of the ban on the slaughter of animals. One view is that the slaughter of all animals (cattle and buffaloes) of all categories should be regulated by the State and that animals below a specified age or not suffering from some natural deformity should not be allowed to be slaughtered. Drastic and stringent regulations have been imposed by municipal laws and have been tried but experience shows that they are not sufficient at least to protect the cow. It has been found to be extremely difficult to enforce the regulations for inadequacy of staff and veterinary inspectors, little or no check on the veterinary inspectors who succumb to the pressure or inducements of the butchers and pass animals not really useless as and for useless and aged animals. A large percentage of the animals not fit for slaughter are slaughtered surreptitiously outside the municipal limits. For reasons of economy rapacious gowalas or callous agriculturists find it uneconomical to maintain the dry cow and even resort to cruel practices and maim the cow in order to get her passed for slaughter. As already stated, the she-buffalo and the breeding bulls and working bullocks (both cattle and buffaloes) for their value, present and future, do not ruin the same amount of danger as a dry cow does. Regulation of slaughter of animals above a specified age may not be quite adequate protection for the cow but may be quite sufficient for the breeding bulls and working bullocks and the she-buffaloes. These considerations induce us to make an exception even in favour of the old and decrepit cows. The counsel for the petitioners, be it said to their credit, did not contend otherwise. After giving our most careful and anxious consideration to the pros and cons of the problem as indicated and discussed above and keeping in view the presumption in favour of the validity of the legislation and without any the least disrespect to the opinions of the legislatures concerned we feel that in discharging the ultimate responsibility cast on us by the Constitution we must approach and analyse the problem in an objective and realistic manner and then make our pronouncement on the reasonableness of the restrictions imposed by the impugned enactments. So approaching and analysing the problem, we have reached the conclusion (i) that a total ban on the slaughter of cows of all ages and calves of cows and calves of she-buffaloes, male and female, is quite reasonable and valid and is in consonance with the directive principles laid down in Art. 48, (ii) that a total ban on the slaughter of she-buffaloes or breeding bulls or working bullocks (cattle as well as buffaloes) as long as they are as milch or draught cattle is also reasonable and valid and (iii) that a total ban on the slaughter of she- buffaloes, bulls and bullocks (cattle or buffalo) after they cease to be capable of yielding milk or of breeding or working as draught animals cannot be supported as reasonable in the interest of the general public.