Three months after 52-year-old Mohammad Ikhlaq was killed over rumours of consuming and storing beef on September 28, an inquiry of the UP Veterinary Department has revealed that the meat in the refrigerator was indeed mutton.
According to the UP government’s chief veterinary officer’s latest report, the reason to justify a man’s lynching in Dadri — that he ate beef — have been proved false. The officer’s forensic report confirms that the meat recovered from Ikhlaq’s refrigerator was mutton, not beef.
The police charge-sheet that had earlier refrained from using the word beef and instead used “a certain kind of meat” now quotes the veterinary officer’s report, media reports confirm. However, the Noida Police are yet to receive a report from the forensic lab. The UP Police had initially faced a lot of flak for having collected the meat samples in the first place. The charge-sheet in the case filed in a magistrate court in Greater Noida last week named 15 persons, including Vishal Rana, son of a local BJP leader.
Ikhlaq’s murder over beef had triggered a massive outrage across the country, with a number of prominent writers returning their Sahitya Akademi awards in protest. A series of controversial statements and visits to Dadri by the BJP leaders kept the issue on the boil. A total of 15 of the 19 accused have been arrested in the case. According to the cops, they had promised to submit the charge-sheet before December 26. However, at the time, investigating officers were “giving final touches to the charge-sheet”.