Click here for the print quality version of Gulshan's ad.
Famous Bollywood "bad man" Gulshan Grover stars in a brand-new PETA India ad to speak out against animal abuse in the leather industry. Gulshan – who is best known for his chilling portrayal of villains in countless Bollywood movies – hopes to encourage Indian citizens to urge their local government and police to take action against illegal severe crowding and other abuses which animals suffer when they are transported to slaughter for leather exported to the West.
"I am a villain only on screen; however, there are real-life villains who treat animals badly", says Gulshan. "I urge India's citizens to help stop animals' needless suffering by insisting that their local governments and police enforce laws against cruel transport and poor treatment of animals by truly bad men."
Animals used by the leather industry are transported to states where they can legally be killed. Forced to walk through the heat and dust for days without food or water, many of the animals collapse. Handlers pull the cattle by ropes through their noses and twist their necks, horns and tails or rub chilli peppers in their eyes to keep them moving.
At the abattoir, it is common for animals to be dragged inside and cut open with dull knives – often in full view of one another, which is illegal. Some animals are skinned and dismembered while still conscious.
This is not the first time Gulshan has teamed up with PETA and raised his voice against the leather industry. In 2004, he shot an ad showing cows jam-packed on a lorry on their way to slaughter. That same year, he starred in a PETA video ad shot by renowned filmmaker Kailash Surendranath.
Want to know what you can do to help animals killed for their skins? You can start by pledging not to wear leather and encouraging your friends and family to boycott leather as well.
You can also fill out our simple form to write to the government and demand the closure of illegal slaughterhouses.
Friday, May 2, 2008
Cruelty in KFC Factory
Bangalore – People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals (PETA) has obtained graphic video footage documenting the daily suffering of thousands of chickens on a factory farm that supplies fast-food restaurant chain KFC. PETA received this footage from a filmmaker who blew the whistle on Venkateshwara Hatcheries in Pune and exposed the farm’s abusive practices. PETA revealed the video footage for the first time at a news conference today in Bangalore. PETA founder and director Ingrid Newkirk, who grew up in India, travelled to Bangalore especially for this presentation. The following were among the abuses that PETA showed at the news conference, which can be viewed at PETAIndia.com:
• Chickens stuffed into overcrowded warehouses, pushing each other to reach their food• Birds whose weak legs crumple beneath them and are immobilized by leg deformities caused by breeding for weight and overfeeding • A barn littered with the carcasses of chickens who died from fatal diseases• Dirty and injured chickens who never receive medical attention• Chickens suffering at the hands of callous workers who neglect to observe even minimal standards of animal welfare
This footage directly contradicts KFC’s self-serving statement to the media that its supply farms strictly adhere to animal-welfare standards.PETA India is encouraging people to adopt a compassionate vegetarian diet or, at the very least, never to set foot in a joint like KFC. PETA India is also encouraging consumers to demand the closure of the only remaining KFC location in the country. The protest is part of an international campaign launched by PETA affiliates all over the world after nearly two years of failed negotiations with KFC’s parent company, Yum! Brands. On the anniversary of the Quit India movement, PETA India wrote to Mr Sandeep Kohli, MD, of Yum! Brands subsidiary Yum! Restaurants International, asking the company to close down the only remaining Indian KFC outlet, located in Bangalore, and quit India. ‘Each bird whom KFC puts into a box or a bucket had a miserable life and a frightening death’, says PETA Director Ingrid Newkirk. ‘People would be shocked to see our footage of a KFC supplier’s employee who walks through a barn, carelessly lighting lamps and letting flames fall on the terrified birds. The air inside these filthy barns reeks of ammonia fumes, making it difficult for the birds to breathe. No one with a grain of compassion should set foot in KFC.’Chickens are probably the most abused animals on the planet. They are inquisitive and interesting animals and are thought to be at least as intelligent as dogs or cats. When in their natural surroundings instead of factory farms, they form friendships and social hierarchies, recognize one another, love their young and enjoy a full life of dust bathing, making nests and roosting in trees. Chickens have a natural lifespan of 10 to 12 years, but at the hands of KFC suppliers, they are slaughtered before they are 8 weeks old.‘KFC wants the public to believe that its chicken suppliers adhere to humane standards’, says Newkirk. ‘This footage tells the real story: Cruelty is the order of the day on KFC contract factory farms. KFC stands for cruelty, and we don’t need this cruel outlet in India.’
To view the factsheet, click here.
Pamela Anderson Speaks Out for Chickens
Whenever animals are in trouble, they can count on their number one “lifeguard,” Baywatch star Pam Anderson. After learning that KFC’s chickens often have their beaks seared off with hot blades and can be scalded alive in the slaughterhouse, Pam penned a letter to prizsm brandz, KFC’s parent company in her homeland of Canada, demanding that the company eliminate the worst abuses of chickens by its factory farm and slaughterhouse providers internationally.
Click here to read Pam’s letter to KFC
For more information, please visit PETA’s Web sites PETAIndia.com and KFCCruelty.com.
Tajinder Singh
KFC Campaign Coordinator
PETA India
• Chickens stuffed into overcrowded warehouses, pushing each other to reach their food• Birds whose weak legs crumple beneath them and are immobilized by leg deformities caused by breeding for weight and overfeeding • A barn littered with the carcasses of chickens who died from fatal diseases• Dirty and injured chickens who never receive medical attention• Chickens suffering at the hands of callous workers who neglect to observe even minimal standards of animal welfare
This footage directly contradicts KFC’s self-serving statement to the media that its supply farms strictly adhere to animal-welfare standards.PETA India is encouraging people to adopt a compassionate vegetarian diet or, at the very least, never to set foot in a joint like KFC. PETA India is also encouraging consumers to demand the closure of the only remaining KFC location in the country. The protest is part of an international campaign launched by PETA affiliates all over the world after nearly two years of failed negotiations with KFC’s parent company, Yum! Brands. On the anniversary of the Quit India movement, PETA India wrote to Mr Sandeep Kohli, MD, of Yum! Brands subsidiary Yum! Restaurants International, asking the company to close down the only remaining Indian KFC outlet, located in Bangalore, and quit India. ‘Each bird whom KFC puts into a box or a bucket had a miserable life and a frightening death’, says PETA Director Ingrid Newkirk. ‘People would be shocked to see our footage of a KFC supplier’s employee who walks through a barn, carelessly lighting lamps and letting flames fall on the terrified birds. The air inside these filthy barns reeks of ammonia fumes, making it difficult for the birds to breathe. No one with a grain of compassion should set foot in KFC.’Chickens are probably the most abused animals on the planet. They are inquisitive and interesting animals and are thought to be at least as intelligent as dogs or cats. When in their natural surroundings instead of factory farms, they form friendships and social hierarchies, recognize one another, love their young and enjoy a full life of dust bathing, making nests and roosting in trees. Chickens have a natural lifespan of 10 to 12 years, but at the hands of KFC suppliers, they are slaughtered before they are 8 weeks old.‘KFC wants the public to believe that its chicken suppliers adhere to humane standards’, says Newkirk. ‘This footage tells the real story: Cruelty is the order of the day on KFC contract factory farms. KFC stands for cruelty, and we don’t need this cruel outlet in India.’
To view the factsheet, click here.
Pamela Anderson Speaks Out for Chickens
Whenever animals are in trouble, they can count on their number one “lifeguard,” Baywatch star Pam Anderson. After learning that KFC’s chickens often have their beaks seared off with hot blades and can be scalded alive in the slaughterhouse, Pam penned a letter to prizsm brandz, KFC’s parent company in her homeland of Canada, demanding that the company eliminate the worst abuses of chickens by its factory farm and slaughterhouse providers internationally.
Click here to read Pam’s letter to KFC
For more information, please visit PETA’s Web sites PETAIndia.com and KFCCruelty.com.
Tajinder Singh
KFC Campaign Coordinator
PETA India
Boycott KFC
The more than 700 million chickens at KFC suppliers’ factory farms lead miserable lives and suffer terrifying deaths. They are crammed by the tens of thousands into sheds that stink of ammonia fumes from the accumulated waste in which they are forced to live, lie and stand for their whole lives; they are given barely enough room to move (each bird lives in the amount of space equivalent to a standard sheet of paper) and they can never see the light of day or enjoy anything a chicken would enjoy in nature. The birds routinely suffer broken bones from being bred to be top-heavy, from callous handling (workers roughly grab birds by their legs and stuff them into crates) and from being shackled upside down at abattoirs. Chickens are often still fully conscious as their throats are cut or when they are dumped into tanks of scalding hot water to remove their feathers.When they’re killed, chickens are still babies less than 2 months old - though chickens have a natural lifespan of 10 to 15 years. Nonetheless, they are just as sensitive as adult birds to the fear and pain they experience when they are violently handled and cruelly treated and transported.Furthermore, a diet heavy in meat, dairy products and other animal products can be deadly to humans. Vegetarians have a markedly lower incidence of heart disease, strokes, diabetes, and several types of cancer than do meat-eaters. The SARS virus, salmonella, E. coli, lysteria and other pathogens are also associated with meat consumption.‘KFC stands for cruelty’, says Anuradha Sawhney, PETA India’s chief functionary. ‘Every bird KFC puts in a box or bucket had a miserable life and a frightening death. The answer is to go vegetarian and put this joint out of business.’ For more information about PETA’s campaign, please visit KFCCruelty.com.
Tajinder Singh
KFC Campaign Coordinator
PETA India
Tajinder Singh
KFC Campaign Coordinator
PETA India
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