Eleven persons were arrested after meat alleged to be beef was found in a plot near an eidgah on Barsana Road in Uttar Pradesh’s Mathura district on Sunday, PTI quoted the police as saying.

The person accused in the matter had allegedly slaughtered an animal belonging to the cow family in the empty plot on Saturday evening. Residents allegedly found an animal’s head and pieces of meat there, the news agency reported.

Eidgahs are open-air enclosures reserved for Eid prayers that are usually situated outside a city or in its outskirts.

On Sunday, Assam Chief Minister Himanta Biswa Sarma said that 16 persons were arrested in the state for allegedly slaughtering cattle illegally on the Muslim festival of Bakri Eid on Saturday.

Bakri Eid, also known as Eid-al-Adha, commemorates the spirit of sacrifice. The festival entails the slaughtering of livestock.

The consumption of beef is not illegal in the state. However, the 2021 Assam Cattle Preservation Act prohibits cattle slaughter and the sale of beef and beef products in areas “predominantly inhabited by Hindu, Jain, Sikh and other non-beef eating communities” or within five km of a temple or a sattra, a Vaishnavite monastery.

Sarma had said that of the 16 arrests, nine were from Cachar district and seven from Sribhumi. The Bharatiya Janata Party leader also claimed that cattle parts were found near Cotton University in Guwahati, and Dhubri, Hojai and Sribhumi districts.

The chief minister said that five “illegal slaughter sites” were found. Three of them were in Cachar district’s Gumrah, Silchar and Lakhipur and two in the Karimganj district’s Badarpur and Banga, he added.

Mathura case

The persons arrested in the case in Mathura were identified as Saqir, Sohil, Intezaar, Ansar, Pintu, Asin, Sunny, Usman, Firoz, Farukh and Shekhar, PTI reported. They are residents of Jain Gali in Mathura’s Govardhan area.

After the incident, members of the Gau Rakshak Dal and other Hindutva groups held a protest at the site, Senior Superintendent of Police Shlok Kumar told PTI.

“We reached the spot and pacified the crowd,” the news agency quoted Kumar as saying.

A first information report was registered under sections of the Uttar Pradesh Prevention of Cow Slaughter Act against 24 identified persons and 50 unidentified individuals.

The senior superintendent of police told PTI that the samples of meat found at the site have been sent to a forensic laboratory for examination.

The persons accused in the matter were identified based on the footage from a security camera, the news agency added.

In a separate incident, a burnt carcass alleged to be of a cow found on the service road of the Yamuna Expressway in Mathura district’s Mant area on Saturday also sparked protests by Hindutva groups.

Mant Circle Officer Gunjan Singh told the news agency that members of Hindutva organisations demanded that an FIR be filed in the case.

Bharatiya Janata Party leader Ashok Saraswat filed a complaint on behalf of Radharani Gauseva Trust, the police said.