However, the male calves, allegedly being sent to illegal slaughterhouses around Anand and Bharuch, were rescued by local animal rights activists, who followed the train from Amirgadh station on the Gujarat-Rajasthan border to Anand.

However, while they were taking the animals to Deesa near Palanpur, three calves died and 10 were injured. The calves were loaded into the goods train at Bhagat ki Kothi railway station near Jodhpur on November 20. But as the train reached Amirgadh station, Pajpur-Deesa Panjrapol secretary Bharat Kothari, a well-known animal rights activist, got wind of it, and reached the station to lodge a protest with the authorities -- to no avail.

Meanwhile, Bachubhai Rambhia, manager of the Gitaben RambhiaSmruti Ahimsa Trust, Ahmedabad, got to know of it and sent some activists to Mehsana.

From there, the activists followed the train upto Kalupur railway station, but not before a two-hour suspense as the train had halted at Khodiar, a previous station.

At Kalupur station, the activists gave a written complaint to police inspector Mewada demanding action against the consignment owner under the Prevention of Cruelty To Animals Act, 1960. The Act lays down that not more than 20 young animals can be kept in a broad-gauge bogie.

``Each of the 38 bogies had between 40-58 calves stuffed. They were packed like sardines. They were tied and had no water or grass,'' said Rambhia. Rambhia claimed that the police inspector even prepared a report, but then asked the activists to go to Anand, where the consignment was being offloaded.

Rambhia even alleged that there were no escorts in the train to arrange for water and grass for the cattle. He suspects that escorts, if any, must have vanished after seeing activistschase the train.

When the train reached Anand early on November 22, activists of the Vishwa Hindu Parishad (VHP), the Hindu Samrajya Sena and senior police and administration officials were present.

According to the activists, a minister from Gandhinagar called them up and requested them not to file a complaint. Rambhia and others said they then called up Union Minister of State for Social Welfare Maneka Gandhi. She asked Dr Arvindkumar Seth of the Animal Welfare Board, Vadodara, to check if the animals were being ill-treated.

Seth confirmed violation of the law and said a police complaint should be filed. Union Deputy Railway Minister Ram Naik, too, gave the go-ahead for filing a complaint if the rules had indeed been broken.

The calves were taken off the bogies and given fodder and water as over 5,000 people gathered to express solidarity with the Rambhia Trust, which then filed a complaint.

The first information report (FIR) names 36 persons, including consigner Bhupatbhai, who, curiously, wasalso the consignee. The first class judicial magistrate, Anand, ordered that the animals be sent to the Deesa panjrapol till investigation was completed.

Deputy commissioner K H Das of the Gujarat Railway Police said the 36 men named in the FIR, who were herding the calves in the train, only said they were going to sell them in the villages.

Das said he found it incongruous that the men, who were ordinarily dressed, could have paid upto Rs 2 lakh for transporting the animals and spent Rs 1,700 daily on whatever fodder the animals were given on the way. ``Besides, at Rs 500 per head of cattle, the consignment would have cost over Rs 8 lakh. How could they have afforded it?''

Though Das said laws had been violated, senior divisional commercial managaer (Vadodara) of Western Railways said this was not the case. Rambhia and others said this was not the first time calves were being brought to Gujarat for illegal slaughter, but this was the largest consignment intercepted by them so far.