RULINGS ABROAD

From ANIMAL PEOPLE, July/August 2000:

Kerala High Court Justices K.
Narayana Kurup and K.V. Sankaranarayanan
ruled on June 7 in Kochi, India, that animals
such as lions, tigers, panthers, bears, and
nonhuman primates, “though not homo sapiens,
are also beings entitled to humane treatment.”
Added the judges, “Though the law currently protects
wildlife and endangered species from extinction,
animals are denied rights, an anachronism
that must change. If humans are entitled to rights,
why not animals?” The judges upheld the authority
of Indian federal minister for social justice and
empowerment Maneka Gandhi to enforce her
October 1998 invocation of the W i l d l i f e
Protection Act of 1972 to bar circus exhibition of
large carnivores and nonhuman primates.

The Jammu and Kashmir High
Court in May ruled on behalf of the W i l d l i f e
Protection Society of India that weaving shahtoosh
cloth as well as hunting the endangered
chiru antelope whose pelts yield shahtoosh wool
is illegal under the Wildlife Protection Act of
1972. Jamma and Kashmir was the only place in
the world where shahtoosh goods were openly
made and sold. The ruling reportedly threw as
many as 20,000 residents of the state out of work.
Actress-turned-animal advocate
Brigitte Bardot was on June 15 convicted in
Paris––for the second time––of allegedly inciting
“discrimination, hatred, or racial violence” with
intemperate words about Islamic sheep-slaughter.
Bardot, fined $3,000 this time for statements in a
1999 book, was also convicted in 1996.