KATHMANDU: The Supreme Court has issued a directive order in the name of concerned government agencies to launch awareness programmes in order to control the cruel act of sacrificing animals during the Gadhimai festival.* A division bench of justices Ishwori Prasad Khatiwada and Anil Kumar Sinha on Thursday directed the Office of the Prime Minister and Council of Ministers, the Ministry of Health and the Ministry of Agricultural Development, among others. Likewise, it directed the government to form a special committee and take appropriate measures to stop the inhumane act of slaughtering animals, informed Court’s Co-Spokesperson Bishworaj Paudel. 'People need to be made aware that slaughtering animal is not a good deed. The government should create such an environment that people make the code of conduct themselves and abide by it,' said the justices in the decision. The bench, however, remarked that it was not reasonable to issue a mandamus to completely stop the sacrifice.* On November 20, 2014, advocate Arjun Kumar Aryal had filed a writ petition demanding the slaughter be stopped and naming the Office of the Prime Minister and Council of Ministers along with the Gadhimai Temple Management Committee as the defendants. READ ALSO:

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*Disclaimer: Earlier the Rastriya Samachar Samiti had reported that the Supreme Court ordered the government to stop animal sacrifice in the Gadhimai festival. But, a copy of the order, which the THT Online received later, reads that is was not an order to stop, but to take discouraging measures. The error is regretted. - Ed.