Editorial: Bullish stance

• There's a strange sense of indifference permeating the collective consciousness of people in Tamil Nadu in the aftermath of the Pongal celebrations this year. It's strange because seven persons were killed in jallikattu and other bull-related sports such as eruthattam and manjuvirattu in the state this week. In the jallikattu organised in Alanganallur in Madurai district, Rachandar Thirumalai in Karur district, and Mangadevanpatti in Pudukottai district, three spectators, which included two elderly citizens, lost their lives. In Sivaganga district, two were killed at a manjuvirattu event, while one person died during an eruthattam event in Salem. In one incident, a bull owner drowned in a tank along with his bull, while he was attempting to rein in the animal which had fled the Siravayal arena.

Several people were reported to have been injured in the events that were held in observance of the traditions representative of Pongal. But there's barely a whimper regarding the circumstances that led to the deaths of these people in what would have ideally been a celebratory occasion. If one had to fall back on data available in the public domain, between 2008 and 2014, as many as 43 people as well as four bulls lost their lives during jallikattu events in the state. In 2018, representatives of the People for Ethical Treatment of Animals (PeTA India) wrote to the then Chief Minister seeking a ban on jallikattu by citing the fact that 23 persons, including bull tamers and spectators, and six bulls, died in the last one year during the conduct of the sport. Even in the first year of the pandemic, Tamil Nadu reported five fatalities as part of the jallikattu events.

The loss of human lives is one side of the story. What needs to be probed is whether there were any safety norms that were flouted in the conduct of such events across the rural hinterlands of Tamil Nadu. In the run-up to most such events, the Animal Husbandry Department issues specific guidelines pertaining to the bull taming sport. These include subjecting the bulls to veterinary examinations while checking them for possible alcohol abuse, a practice that is carried out covertly by unscrupulous agents. There are also supposedly stringent guidelines pertaining to the safety and emergency measures that need to be set up at the venues of the bull running events. Apart from providing the venues with ambulances for people as well as animals, the organisers are to ensure that the barricades are built eight feet high to prevent the entry of the bulls into the spectator gallery.

Of course, when it comes to matters of regional identity and culture, concerns such as the well-being of the sportspersons or the spectators involved, or that of the animals almost become inconsequential or an afterthought, seen in the light of the greater common good. Animal rights activists have been crying hoarse for decades together that having made such giant reformative leaps politically and socially, the folks in Tamil Nadu still haven’t been able to tame their obsession of manhandling voiceless animals in an atypically bloodthirsty fashion, purely on account of displaying a certain brand of old-fashioned masculinity. One might say, to each his own, but it’s worth wondering why women have never really been made participants in the jallikattu arena (barring a handful of times). Maybe, inclusivity hasn’t got much to do with it.