Can we make our Eid more Islamic?

Eid-ul-Azha, the annual festival of sacrifice for Muslims in the name of Allah, was celebrated quite recently this year in Bangladesh. Like previous years, the festivity was all about the size of a cow and the number of cows to be slaughtered by a particular family, as if that is all that matters. True Islamic injunction prescribes that a Muslim for whom Zakat is obligatory, will alone sacrifice a goat or a lamb or share one-seventh of a cow or camel in being slaughtered. But most well-to-do Muslims in this country do so not only for himself or herself, but also for every member of their family, including any newborns, for parents dead or alive, and of course, for some Islamic saints whom they revere -- hence, the increase in the number of shares for sacrifice. On average, a rich family “sacrifices” a minimum of three to four and a maximum of nine to 10 large bovines. As it is said in the Holy Qur’an, what matters most is not the size and the price of the animals sacrificed. Instead it is “taqua” -- the fear of Allah with which the animal is sacrificed by the Muslim individual -- which is valued most. The ultimate question is: Do we go through the festivity to please Allah or to flaunt our vanity and arrogance in being rich and powerful in society, content in being able to enjoy eating the meat of the sacrificed animals throughout the whole year by preserving it in our freezers? We must remember that, as human beings, we have nothing to be proud of, and that pride is the sole divine prerogative of Allah, the creator and sustainer of mankind and the universe. I wonder if the person buying cows for Tk2 lakh or more pays Zakat or income tax of an equivalent amount in a year. Sacrificial animals being slaughtered on road-sides and on open stretches of land in residential areas, disturbing the ecology and the environment and creating health hazards, animals being lined up in rows, the pain of an animal’s life being snuffed out slowly as the animal groans and bleeds out, other animals watching and waiting to get slaughtered, etc -- these are not things Islam approves of. But these things continue to happen year after year, while our city’s curators just watch and keep promising improvements which never pan out. The underlying Islamic spirit of sacrificing is that animals must be slaughtered by causing them the least possible amount of pain, and by never allowing them to see other animals getting slaughtered. Additionally, the slaughtering grounds must be kept hygienic and free of any foul odours. But our faults don’t just end with our Eid-day rituals. Islam strictly prohibits, and prescribes the severest punishment for fornication and adultery like no other religion. Yet, rape and gang-rape of women have become disconcertingly frequent in this country, despite the fact that our leadership and opposition comprise primarily of female figure-heads. Islam also prohibits dowry, yet women from poor and middle-class families are being persecuted relentlessly, physically beaten, and even killed over dowries. The holy Qur’an says that, if you kill an innocent man or a woman, it is as if you have killed the whole of humanity. But men and women are being routinely killed in this country, with the killers mostly getting away unpunished because they either possess the right amount of money or political clout, or both. A drug addict administers sleeping tablets to her parents’ drinks, rendering them unconscious and then killing them in cold blood. Despite all the evidence against her, the girl is not going to be punished for the crime she committed -- who can we blame for all this? There are countless other such cases of justice being denied in this predominantly Muslim majority country, where Islam is hailed as the state religion, but has its efficacy been diminished?