RAWALPINDI: For many like Saleem Ahmed, Eidul Azha brings an opportunity to earn some extra money to supplement their income.

A resident of Chittian Hattian, 35-year-old Ahmed opened a temporary shop at his home to clean the hooves (Payas) of sacrificial animals and mince meat for the residents. He arranged a mincer and a stove to burn and clean the hooves of goats and bulls and charged Rs50 per kg.

“Being a private employee, I could not afford to buy a sacrificial animal on Eidul Azha. But I opened the temporary shop in my house and offered my services to those who slaughtered sacrificial animals.”

He said during the three days, he earned enough money to pay his sister’s college fee. He said as the quality of education in the government educational institutions was not good, he sent his sister to a private college.

Malik Khizar, a resident of Mohanpura, said he also established a temporary shop in the locality. “It was a good idea. I provided services to the citizens and in return got paid.”

He said mostly people had no spare time or the expertise to clean the hooves of animals and mince meat at home and wasted the hooves of sacrificial animals.

Many other people also set up similar setups in the garrison city during the three days of the Eid. Earlier, most of the citizens had to wait for the reopening of the butcher shops to get the hooves clean.

Makeshift shops appear during Eid days offering services related to sacrificial animals

Zulfiqar Ahmed, a resident of Mohanpura, said one can mince meat at home but most of the housewives remained busy in entertaining their guests during the Eid holidays.

He said he took meat to a temporary shop where it was minced within a few minutes. He said he also left the payas at the shop for cleaning and after a few hours it was ready to cook.

Ali Raza, a resident of Purana Qila, said it was easy to get meat minced in a machine instead of chopping it by hand.

He said the temporary shopkeepers charged reasonably even though they operated their machines on electricity. ”My wife felt a sigh of relief after I took the minced meat and ready payas home,” he said.

On the other hand, some people were also seen collecting animal waste in and around the city to sell them to traders.

Mostly nomads established colonies to collect the intestines, fat and other animal waste to sell it to traders for making it threads used in hospitals or for the production of sports goods.

Each animal’s intestines and other waste are sold for about Rs100.

“I earned over Rs1,000 a day,” Raju, a child collecting animal waste in Raja Bazaar, told Dawn.

He said he collected the waste from garbage dumps on the roadsides. Many sanitary workers were also involved in the collection of the waste to sell it to the traders.

Published in Dawn, September 28th , 2015

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