Mumbai: An elderly man travelling on a train in Maharastra was attacked by fellow passengers on suspicion of him carrying beef while others watched, NDTV reported.
Footage showed nearly a dozen men questioning Ashraf Munyar , travelling on Dhule Express to his daughter's house in Malegaon, about meat-like substance in two plastic boxes he was carrying.
Alongside slapping him, they asked what he was carrying, where he was taking it to, whether goats were not available and how many people were going to eat it.
Munyar, a resident of Jalgaon district, reportedly said that he was taking the meat to his daughter’s family.
Despite his answer, the men kept questioning him about the meat while recording the incident on the phone.
The visibly shaken man at some point said it was buffalo meat in the box.
To which one man responded that ‘we will know about it (the kind of meat) once we get it tested’, adding he was doing in the Sawan season.
Sawan, or the month of Shravan, is one of the holy months for Hindus.
The Maharashtra Animal Preservation Act 1976 bans the slaughter of cows, bulls and bullocks but excluded buffaloes.
After the incident gained attention, the Railway Commissioner reportedly registered a First Information Report (FIR) and the railway police are looking for the passengers who assaulted the man.
A police team has been sent to Dhule look for two people involved in the incident, after they were identified as resident of Dhule.
Leader of Sharad Pawar's NCP camp Jitendra Awhad blamed the state’s law and order saying that ‘This is not Maharashtra. This is not our culture. Where will this stop’.