After receiving a representation from Mercy For Animals India Foundation, the head of the Department of Livestock Production Management at Bihar Animal Sciences University, Patna, has confirmed via a letter that Bihar Veterinary College is not using or recommending the use of gestation and farrowing crates.
The letter directs the veterinary college to ensure compliance with Section 11(1)(e) of the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals Act, 1960, which states that any person who “keeps or confines any animal in any cage or receptacle which does not measure sufficiently in height, length and breadth to permit the animal a reasonable opportunity for movement” is punishable by fine or imprisonment.
After appeals from Mercy For Animals India Foundation and other groups, more than 16 states—including Goa, Karnataka, Madhya Pradesh, Himachal Pradesh, Uttar Pradesh, Uttarakhand, Andhra Pradesh, Odisha, Telangana, Manipur, Mizoram, Gujarat, Rajasthan, Sikkim, West Bengal, and Punjab—have banned the use of gestation and farrowing crates.
Mother pigs in factory farms are abused for most of their lives. They are confined in cages that are barely larger than their bodies—gestation crates during pregnancy and farrowing crates when giving birth. Mother pigs suffer in these crates, enduring a cycle of pregnancy and birth until they are slaughtered.
Join us in urging the Ministry of Fisheries, Animal Husbandry and Dairying to prohibit the manufacture, sale, and use of gestation and farrowing crates for pigs in compliance with the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals Act, 1960.
