Plea to provide jumbo for Giarhveeh rally

Charminar: For ensuring that the yearly procession of Giarhveeh Shareef of Hazrath Syedna Ghouse-e-Azam Datagir continues at a grand scale by availing of the service of elephant from the zoo, Hazrath Ghouse-e-Azam Welfare Society has demanded that the State government either come up with a law or provide elephant from other State.

According to society, while the GO Ms No 132 of 2009 prohibits the use of elephant in religious processions, rules were relaxed for Bibi-ka-Alam (during Moharram) and even the Bonalu. Hence, the Society filed a writ petition in the High Court seeking permission for even Giarhveeh Shareef, as it availed the provision for over two decades.

However, the recent judgement by High Court not only dismissed the petition of Society for continuing services of the tuskers in procession, but also prohibited others. This not only impacted the festivities of Giarhveeh Shareef, but also other important processions of Bibi-ka-Alam and even the Bonalu. All these processions were availing of the services of zoo elephant Rajani.

In its petition, the Society underscored that Rajani was provided for the procession of Bonalu and Moharram, the same was not being provided for the Giarhveeh Shareef procession in view of Memo dated 07-03-2017. "The zoo authority is not providing the elephant Rajani for conducting the procession and falsely stated that the animal was not trained for the procession. It is arbitrary, illegal and discrimination as the elephant was provided to the society since 1995," said Moosa Khan, the president of Ghouse-e-Azam welfare society.

He alleged that the Principal Chief Conservator of Forest and Wild Life has failed to implement the orders of the Chief Secretary of the Department of Environment, Forest, Science and Technology, Telangana state, who granted permission.

Speaking to The Hans India, Moosa Khan said that the zoo authorities supplied the Elephant 'Rajani' to the society from 1995 to 2016 and thereafter, discrimination was being shown toward, claiming that there was no special training for elephant kept in Nehru Zoological Park. But he asked if it was so, how the zoo authorities could supply the tusker for other processions. There was no untoward incident in all these years, he also pointed out.

"The zoo is under the control of the government and the zoo authorities cannot disobey and refuse to implement the orders of the government according to Memo of 2018 issued in favor of the society. Not supplying the elephant to the society when it was supplying the same to others violates Article 14 of the Constitution of India. The society also pays Rs 31,000 and cooperates with police authorities for maintaining law and order during the course of procession," pointed out Mossa.

Moosa said that their demand was only to continue what was being in practice and provide the animal during the festivities like two other processions. "If the government cannot relax the norms, then it can provide the animal from a private organisation or from other State," he added.

The Giarhveeh Shareef procession has been taking place for more than 45 years. It is organised on the occasion of birth anniversary of Hazrath Syedna Ghouse-e-Azam Datagir, a revered saint of India. The procession is generally attended by more than 10,000 Sunni Muslims and it starts from Chilla Mubarak, Irani Galli, and passed through Panjesha, Etebar Chowk, Kotla Alijha, Sardar Mahal and Charminar and thereafter returns from Charminar via Gulzar Houz, Machli Kaman.