Kathmandu, July 29: A centuries old tradition of animal slaughter at a temple festival in Nepal has been banned, media reported.
The festival, organised once every five years at Gadhimai temple in Bariyapur witnesses huge crowd of devotees from Nepal and India to sacrifice thousands of animals in the hope of appeasing the Hindu goddess of power.
We have decided to completely stop the practice of animal sacrifice, said Motilal Prasad, secretary of the Gadhimai Temple Trust, reported media.
Nepal is known for practice of ritual of animal sacrifice to appease the god.
Around 200,000 animals were sacrificed during the Gadhimai festival held in November 2014 in Bariyapur village near the Indian border.
The Animal rights activists admired the decision to stop the animal sacrifice.
According to legend, the first animal sacrifices in Bariyapur were held several centuries ago. The legend says that one night the goddess Gadhimai appeared to a prisoner in a dream and asked him to build a temple to her. The prisoner, when he woke up from the sleep, saw that his shackles had fallen open. He then came out of the jail, built the temple and sacrificed animals as a gesture of gratitude.
