Kerala Chief Minister Oommen Chandy on Thursday, 29 October shot off a second letter to Prime Minister Narendra Modi saying that the appropriate authority to inspect New Delhi's Kerala House on the matter of serving beef should have been a veterinary officer and not the Delhi Police.
"The first letter was the formal expression of protest and today's letter is one which points out the provisions as per the rules laid down," Chandy said about the incident that has caused a furore.
"It's under the Delhi Agricultural Cattle Preservation Act, 1994. The appropriate authority -- the veterinary officer -- should first give (notice) in writing and then enter the Kerala House to conduct an inspection," the chief minister said.
"In the act, the Delhi Police's role is to search the vehicles at the entry point if it carries cattle for slaughter. The rules are very, very clear and hence what they did was against the rules," he maintained.
In his second letter to Modi, Chandy has admonished the Delhi Police officials and termed their barging into the Kerala House canteen as "tyrannical and reprehensible".
"The whole episode is a total disregard of legal niceties by the Delhi Police, which is controlled by the central government in a constitutionally federal structure," he wrote.
On Monday, 26 October, Delhi Police had conducted a raid at the Kerala House canteen, following a false complaint by a Hindutva activist that beef was being served there. Cow slaughter and beef are legally banned in Delhi.
