Beware the self-proclaimed butcher

Paying less to get an amateur butcher may just ruin your Eid and lead to animal cruelty.

LAHORE: Butchers may be charging up to Rs3,000 to slaughter a goat this Eid-ul-Azha, but it will be money well spent if they do the job properly. Paying less to get an amateur may ruin your Eid.

At least that was the experience of Mohammad Saqib, a retired army officer who lives in Cantonment, last year. His sacrificial goat turned out to be pregnant, but the ‘butcher’ did not notice that. Islam does not encourage the slaughter of pregnant animals.

“What kind of butcher does not know a pregnant animal?” asked Saqib, who could not afford another goat. “This is just another way of making money. What these people forget is that they will be held accountable by God and punished.”

Saleem Ahmed, a resident of Garden Town, says people should be wary of butchers charging too little. He became suspicious when a man he was negotiating with for the slaughter of his animal on Eid went from an opening offer of Rs1,500 immediately down to Rs500.His neighbours had referred Ahmed to the man, who was their maid’s brother-in-law from Kasur. “They told me that he had come to the city to make money during Eid-ul-Azha. He worked as a butcher at a poultry shop in Kasur. He had never slaughtered a goat,” he said.

Residents of Saddar Bazaar, Cantonment, said that last year they had caught several non-Muslim butchers pretending to be Muslims and handed them over to the police. Animals slaughtered by non-Muslims are not considered halal.

Qari Mohammad Imran of the Jamaatul Khair madrassa in Johar Town, said that amateur butchers not only ruin the sacrifice, but are also cruel to the animals. Islam does not allow the torture of animals, he said. “The neck must be quickly cut with a sharp knife. Otherwise the sacrifice is resented (makrooh),” he said.

He added that learning about the traditional Islamic method of slaughtering animals would help people judge proper butchers from amateurs.

Published in The Express Tribune, November 17^th, 2010.