'This is double standard': Yogi on Muslim clerics’ demand to declare cow national animal

Lucknow: Uttar Pradesh Chief Minister Yogi Adityanath on Monday termed as "double standard" the demand by some Muslim clerics to declare cow ‘national animal’ saying that the cow had always been the ‘mother of the nation’ and that there was no need for a formal announcement to validate this status.

‘’I have come to know that some maulanas have demanded that cows be declared a national animal. The cow is already our mother and our bond with the cow spans beyond lifetimes. No formal declaration is required to define the relationship between a mother and her child,’’ Adityanath said while speaking at a function in Bijnor.

‘’On one hand you (Muslim clerics) encourage cow slaughter and on the other you demand that cows be declared a national animal; this is ‘doglapan’ (double standard)’’, he added.

He issued a stern warning against cow slaughter saying that his government would punish the offenders in such a way that their future generations would understand the consequences of cow slaughter.

Adityanath, while referring to the killing of a Hindu boy by his Muslim friend in Ghaziabad recently, said that the parents must rein in their wayward children and make them understand that they were making a "grave error" by doing such things.

Recently some Muslim clerics, after the Calcutta High Court’s observation that cow slaughter was not part of Eid nor was mandatory in Islam, demanded that the cow be declared a national animal.