Outswinger: Dhaka Roads turn Bloody: Thanks to Goat Killing (sacrifices) and Rain

• Dr. Munish Raizada (Twitter)

Dhaka, Bangladesh: This is unprecedented. The animal cruelty and killing in the name of religious sacrifices presented a savage scene for the humanity:

These pictures were posted on September 13 at Twitter by @EdwardRees who as per the Twitter account lives in Dhaka and is associated with the United Nations.

September 12-15 is being observed as Eid-al-Adha (also known as Bakrid)- a prominent religious festival in Islam. This day is a "Feast of Sacrifice",i.e., Muslims kill (sacrifice) goats to Allah and then distribute this sacrifice as feast among themselves.

Millions of goats are slaughtered on this day to quench the bloody thirst of humanity. The roads of Dhaka presented gory details of the pious day: Blood spreading into streets compounded by lashes of rains! Result: "Rivers of Blood in Dhaka" as Dhaka Tribune depicted the scenario with this headline.

India Today appropriately termed the scene as "Dhaka streets transforming into Blood Streams after Eid sacrifices and Rain."

In a true sense of 'Religion is opium', a developing country with poor infra structure and inability to effectively cope with natural excesses (if not calamity) admixed with over zeal for religion played out a perfectly sorrowful scenario in form of sanguinous streets.

Animal killing at a mass level as a religious celebration sounds horrific and grotesque. However, this time I found a different chatter also. May be due to convergence brought about by social media, this sentiment got louder also: People are questioning why animal killing! Social media was abuzz with these hashtags: #EcofriendlyEid and #BloodlessEid

At least, a debate is happening!

Rakesh Chauhan from Narnaul, India gave a cogent argument:

नर मुंड का स्थान नारियल ले सकता है तो बकरे का स्थान लौकी या पपीता क्यों नहीं? सनातन धर्म तुम महान हो! #EcoFriendlyEid

Anna Solaiman wrote a blog on The Huffington Post and stated: "I am celebrating all life with a Vegan Eid." She adds: "The faithful can choose to reject animal sacrifices and instead show mercy and compassion during Eid simply by eating vegan.."

Hi five to Anna!

Religion and compassion go hand in hand. Let this moral equation not be disturbed!

(Outswinger: Through my Outswingers, I speak on a host of issues- local to global!)