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Even in the present refined and civilized times, we find some rulers of Indian States and principalities celebrating the brightest day in the annals of Hindu tradition, the Vijaya Dashmi, the day of the conquest of Rama over Rávana, by a wholesale massacre of buffaloes and goats in the name of religion, and a feast on the flesh thus obtained is believed to be an act of religious piety,
The Muslim festival of Baquar-Id or Id-ul-Zuha commemorates the sacrifice of his son by Abraham; and in India where the cow is held sacred as a mother by the Hindus, the cruel cow-slaughter has during the last 45 years or so, led to serious riots, resulting in considerable loss of human life, and injury to person and property.
Before many an altar of Hindu goddesses, thousands of animals and fowls are slaughtered by the priests, and their flesh distributed to the congregation as a sacrament. Such slaughter has hardened the hearts of the Hindus also, and they do not hesitate to meet their Muslim brothers in mortal combat, on religious pretexts.
Most heinous Himsis thus committed in the name of religion, and God, and goddesses.
The notion that the victim of a religious sacrifice is a for: tunate being who suffers no pain, and attains bliss everlasting in the heavens on high, is obviously ill-founded. The moans and sufferings, the writhings and wrigglings of the victim are tangible, and the loud noises created by the beating of drums and cymbals, and the chanting of hymns and psalms only serve to deaden sensibility of the insufferable sight. The sacrificial post, the q, is an outstanding feature of the Ashrams of Hindu sages. Why should there be need of a post to tie the victim to, if the sacrificial slaughter was not forcible killing of one who was unwilling to die.
Writing about the Durga Pooja sacrifices, Mr. Bipin Chandra Pal says:
“Goats only were sacrificed in our house, as a rule. I had then no sense of the cruelty of the thing. No tender feel. ings for the poor dumb animal that, when forced down into
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