In the wee hours of Sunday, a team of police officials seized a huge quantity of prohibited bovine meat from a triple-story building at the densely-populated Dhatkidih locality, which falls under Bistupur Police station.

The police arrested one person for running a clandestine slaughterhouse and seized all the types of equipment used for slaughtering animals.

According to sources, the second floor of the building had been converted into a slaughterhouse, while people continued to stay on the floors below.

Vishnu Raut, OC, Bistupur police station, confirmed the news, however, he didn’t disclose the number of cattle seized from the unauthorised slaughterhouse.

“We have seized around 80 kgs of bovine meat from an illegal slaughterhouse that had been set up on the second floor of the residential building. A 40-year-old man identified as Anwar Qureshi has been arrested for running the slaughterhouse. He used to sell the meat clandestinely to people. We are in the process of sending them to the jail,” said Raut while talking to The Telegraph Online.

The OC said that they had conducted the raid at about 3 am on Sunday after getting specific information about the unauthorised slaughterhouse.

This is not the first time that a residential building has been identified as a bovine slaughterhouse. In 2018, about half-a-dozen cows were seized by police from the first floor of a residential building at Dhatkidih locality.

Regularly, police do seize bovine mean being brought into Jamshedpur from places like Haldipokhar and Chandil. But the running of an unauthorised slaughterhouse close to Tata Main Hospital has shocked the residents of Dhatkidih locality itself.

“At a time when the district administration is trying to eliminate Coronavirus from the steel city, the act of running a clandestine slaughterhouse inside a residential building of a densely-populated area like Dhatkidih is a serious crime. The police and administration should stop such activity strongly as it tends to create friction,” observed Saheel Akhtar, a resident of Dhatkidih while talking to this website.

Akhtar, a businessman said the residents should remain vigilant about such activity and inform the police immediately when needed.

It may be noted cow slaughter has been banned in Jharkhand since 2005. The ban has made unscrupulous businessmen Qureshi to trade in the bovine meat in and around Jamshedpur.