As per page 96 of Local Government Gazette, Part IV (B), Nalin Priyantha Sooriyage, Chairman, Urban Council, Bandarawela, has " prohibited the slaughter of animals and the sale of meat" on three very important Muslim festive days, viz: March 6th (Haj festival), June 5th, (Prophet Mohamad’s birthday - which is not a public holiday, or a day of celebration even in Saudi Arabia, where he was born) and on December 17 (Ramazan) day.

This is a grave injustice to the Muslims in the Bandarawela UC area and others who depend on the butchers for their daily pound of flesh. What is worse is the prohibition is imposed by non believers. In countries like Saudi Arabia, on Haj and Ramzan days, millions of animals and birds are slaughtered both for food and as sacrificial offerings which, in frozen form, are exported only to Muslim countries for consumption. Sri Lanka, they say, is a multi-religious country and, if that were a fact, no single religious group, including the non Buddhists, has a right to deny another religious group what is theirs by divine decree.

To stretch this argument a step further, I suggest the government should allow every religious group to do what is best for them, without imposing its will upon others, if we are to maintain the national unity.

What is important here is a man’s religion, not the race as some critics seem to suggest. Was it not for the spread of one’s religion (organised religions) that entire countries were laid waste, flourishing civilizations like Mayas, Aztecs etc., wiped out and countless Buddhist shrines and colossal Buddha statutes of Barmiyan fame razed to the ground in the name of their Gods and their own shrines erected over the shamed rubble?

Wijeya Siriwardene
Kandy