New Delhi: The Union government has withdrawn the draft Livestock and Livestock Products (Importation and Exportation) Bill, 2023 after protests from animal rights activists. The Bill was meant to regulate the import and export of animals, including dogs and cats, and proposed to treat livestock as a “commodity”. It aimed to replace the 125-year-old Live-stock Importation Act, 1898.According to The Indian Express, the Department of Animal Husbandry and Dairying, which comes under Ministry of Fisheries, Animal Husbandry and Dairying, issued an office memorandum Tuesday to withdraw the draft Bill.The draft Bill had been circulated for public comments on June 7. It received serious blowback, with activists saying it would open floodgates of import and export of all kinds of animals and also be a problem for native animals’ gene pool. The Bill had led to protests in a number of cities.“During consultation, it has been viewed that enough time is required to understand the proposed draft and to make further comments/suggestions,” the Department said in its office memorandum on Tuesday. Since many had written in “expressing concerns on the proposed draft involving sensitivity and emotions with animal welfare and related aspects,” the draft “would need a wider consultation”.According to The Indian Express, the new Bill “is different from the existing law in three key aspects — it allows export of live animals, it widens the scope of animal import-export (including cats and dogs among ‘live-stock’), and takes away some powers of state governments to regulate this area”.“Any import or export of animals as commodities is cruel upon them. A large number of native animals are being exported to climates that are not conducive to them,” animal rights activist Gauri Maulekhi told The Print.“The proposed Livestock and Livestock Products [Importation and Exportation] Bill, allowing the live export of animals from India, is a blanket free pass for the abuse of millions of animals farmed for food and other uses. According to 2021 figures released by the United Nations, almost 2 billion of the 80 billion land animals raised for food around the world are exported alive to different countries,” Bharati Ramachandran, CEO, Federation of Indian Animal Protection Organisations, was quoted by The Indian Express as saying.