PETA India has released an investigative report of the abuse faced by bulls used in Tamil Nadu’s annual jallikattu. PETA published a 75-page report with visuals from Madurai, Pudukkottai, Dindigul, and Tiruppur districts of Tamil Nadu, detailing what its activists had witnessed first-hand in January this year. 2019 marks the second year that the jallikattu has taken place legally in the state, after a massive protest in 2017 saw the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals Act (1960) amended to ‘preserve the cultural heritage’ of the state.
The organization has alleged extreme cruelty to animals as well as disregard for human life. Visuals from various districts show the bulls collapsing in exhaustion and being dragged and pulled by nose ropes. The bull-taming event involves bulls being brought through the entrance. They will then enter the main arena where the tamers will attempt to tame them and emerge victorious. Visuals released by PETA from this Jallikattu season show the tails of bulls being bitten, reportedly in order to provoke them to enter the vaadi vaasal.
The report states that Bulls were poked and hit with wooden sticks and metal spears, whacked with bare hands and blindfolded, and their tails were twisted, yanked, and bitten while they were in the waiting area in order to force them to enter the vaadi vaasal. PETA India says that photographic evidence from the jallikattu events show bulls’ nostrils bleeding even as they are led forward with nose ropes. While the amended rules from 2017 mandate that jallikattu be conducted in open ground, PETA alleges that the events were conducted in the middle of towns or villages on a narrow public road
