PM Modi in Townhall: Lashes out against Gau rakshaks, calls them black-marketers

Prime Minister Narendra Modi today lashed out at ‘Gau Rakshaks’ or cow vigilantes, accusing them of misusing the term to make profit through hooliganism.

PM Modi, speaking at his first-ever Townhall in Indira Gandhi Indoor Statidum in New Delhi, said that 80 per cent of such rakshaks are fake and they make him angry. 

He asked state governments to prepare “dossiers” on the so-called cow protectors as 80 per cent of them do illegal activities at night and become cow protectors in the day, asserting that running such help groups does not mean harassing others.

“Gau raksha ke naam pe jo log dukaan khol ke baithe hain, mujhe unpe bada gussa aata hai (People who have opened their shops in the name of cow vigilantism make me very angry),” said PM Modi. 

He added, “There are many cow vigilantes, but they just want to run their black market business under the shield of the title.” “Cows mostly die of eating plastic bags and these Cow rakshaks should urge people not to throw plastic on roads, this will be a big service,” he said. 

His comments come at a time when his government and BJP are facing flak over incidents of violence against Dalits and Muslims by cow vigilantes in various states including Uttar Pradesh, Gujarat and Madhya Pradesh.

Recalling his own work in the service of cow, he said at one health camp organised by him for the animal, at least two buckets full of plastic were removed from the stomach of one of them.

(With PTI Inputs)