A Gandhinagar court sentenced three persons from Ahmedabad to life imprisonment in a cow slaughter case in an order that extensively cited Manusmriti, referring to the cow as “mother of the world”.

The accused — Vasim Qureshi, 34, from Juhapura; Mohammad Rafiq Qureshi, 24, from Behrampura and Asfaq Behlim, 19, from Sarkhej in Ahmedabad — were found to be in possession of 277 kg of meat, which was later confirmed to be beef, during a police crackdown on August 22, 2024.

The three were sentenced under the Gujarat Animal Preservation Act, 1954, which was amended in 2017 to award life sentences to violators of the law that bans the slaughter of cows and their progeny.

The order began by quoting a Sanskrit shloka that is roughly translated as: “Protecting the cow is an act associated with religion and compassion, while justice protects the truth. Where the killing of a cow takes place, legal action should be taken.…