Amritsar Holy City Meat Ban: Fish Trader’s 55-Year-Old Shop Sealed, takes ‘Holy City’ Case to Court
Amritsar Holy City meat ban: Kuldeep Fish Company, a 55-year-old fish trader in Amritsar’s Hall Gate Fish Market, has challenged Punjab’s Holy City notification in the Punjab and Haryana High Court after his shop was sealed without a court order.
North Desk Correspondent
Chandigarh, June 1
A fish trader whose family has run a shop in Amritsar’s Hall Gate Fish Market since 1970 has moved the Punjab and Haryana High Court challenging the Punjab government’s decision to declare the Walled City of Amritsar a “Holy City” and the consequential ban on the sale, storage, use and display of meat and fish products within that area.
The petition came up before a division bench of Justice Harsimran Singh Sethi and Justice Deepak Manchanda. The court issued notice and sought a reply from the state. The matter has been adjourned to later this month.
About the fish trader
Amritsar Holy City meat ban: Rajiv Gulati, 39, proprietor of Kuldeep Fish Company at Hall Gate Fish Market, Amritsar, holds a valid licence issued by the Municipal Corporation, Amritsar, permitting him to cut and sell raw fish and meat. The licence was renewed for the year 2024-25 after due verification of statutory, municipal and health requirements. Gulati has been regularly paying licence fees, municipal charges and taxes, and no complaint had ever been registered against him or his establishment prior to the impugned action.
His shop, the petition notes, has been in continuous operation for over five decades under the “Kuldip Fish” signboard — “Since 1970, 50 Years Old and Famous” — and is his sole source of livelihood, along with that of his employees and their dependent families.
Amritsar Holy City meat ban: What the Government Did
Amritsar Holy City meat ban: On December 15, 2025, the Governor of Punjab issued a gazette notification declaring the Walled City of Amritsar, Sri Anandpur Sahib and Talwandi Sabo (Sri Damdama Sahib) as “Holy Cities” of the State of Punjab. The notification was issued by the Department of Home Affairs.
The same day, a second communication was issued, forwarding the Holy City declaration to various departments with specific requests: the Department of Excise was asked to restrict liquor sales; the Department of Health and Family Welfare was asked to prohibit cigarettes and tobacco products; and the Department of Animal Husbandry was requested to issue prohibitory orders for the sale and use of meat, fish and raw meat products within the Walled City of Amritsar and the municipal limits of Sri Anandpur Sahib and Talwandi Sabo.
On December 23, 2025, the Department of Animal Husbandry issued a formal prohibitory order banning the sale and use of meat within the Walled City, with immediate effect. This order was signed by Rahul Bhandari, Principal Secretary.
On March 24, 2026, Gulati and similarly situated traders received a notice from the Health Department of the Municipal Corporation, Amritsar, directing them to cease all sale, storage and display of meat products by March 31, 2026, failing which sealing and confiscation of goods was threatened.
On April 20, 2026, authorities arrived at the Hall Gate Fish Market and forcibly sealed Gulati’s business premises. No sealing order was shown to the petitioner, and no contemporaneous statutory authority for the action was produced despite repeated requests.
On May 8, 2026, a fresh notice was issued by a departmental committee restraining Gulati from sale, storage, use and display of meat and fish products within the Walled City.
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How the Case Came to Court
Amritsar Holy City meat ban: This is not the first time Amritsar traders have approached the High Court over the Holy City declaration. In February 2026 in a petition filed by Ranjit Singh and others, the court disposed of the matter after the state represented that no prohibitory order had been issued.
In April 2026, a batch of traders filed a petition. During the hearing, the Additional Advocate General again told the court that no prohibitory notification had been issued and that sealing notices would be withdrawn. The court disposed of the petition with liberty to challenge should such orders be issued.
However, as the Kuldeep Fish Company petition now reveals, the December 23, 2025 prohibitory order had already been issued by that time but was not brought to the notice of the court.
It was only subsequently that the existence of the December 23 order became apparent. The Kuldeep Fish Company petition now directly challenges that order along with the foundational December 15 notifications.
The Legal Challenge
The petition, argued by Senior Advocate Vikas Chatrath, raises a wide range of constitutional challenges.
At its core, the argument is that the “Holy City” declaration and Amritsar Holy City meat ban has no statutory backing. The notification does not cite any enabling Act, rule, regulation, bye-law or delegated legislative instrument authorising the state either to declare an area a Holy City or to prohibit an otherwise lawful and licensed trade within municipal limits. Neither “Holy City” nor “Walled City” is defined under any Punjab statute or municipal framework.
The petition argues that the regulation of slaughterhouses, butcher shops and fish markets falls squarely within the domain of the Punjab Municipal Corporation Act, 1976, particularly Chapter XVIII, and that any restriction upon such trade can only be imposed through valid statutory provisions and due process — not through executive notifications founded on undefined religious or territorial expressions.
On the constitutional side, the petition invokes Articles 14 (equality before law), 19(1)(g) (right to carry on any occupation, trade or business), 21 (right to life and livelihood), 13 (laws inconsistent with fundamental rights to be void), 162 and 166 (extent and conduct of executive power of the state).
The petition argues the action is manifestly arbitrary — the Walled City has been singled out while identical trades in other parts of Amritsar and across the state remain unaffected. There is no rational basis, intelligible differentia or empirical data supporting the classification.
The petition further argues the notifications do not merely regulate the trade but virtually extinguish it in the notified area. No less restrictive alternatives — zoning, distance-based regulation, licensing conditions, relocation with transition time — were considered.
The petition cites a Supreme Court’s judgment which held that the right to livelihood is an integral facet of the right to life, and that no person can be deprived of livelihood except according to just, fair and reasonable procedure.
The petition also argues that the state’s reliance on Articles 25 and 26 of the Constitution to justify the Holy City declaration would be misconceived — those provisions protect individual freedom of conscience and the autonomy of religious denominations, but do not authorise the state to transform religious sentiments into enforceable civil restrictions applicable to the general public.
An additional argument addresses the Sikh Rehat Maryada: even within that religious code, the interdiction is specifically with respect to Kutha meat, and cannot be read as a blanket prohibition on all forms of meat, fish or allied food products — let alone as a statutory prohibition enforceable against all traders, regardless of faith, within an entire municipal area.
On the absence of rehabilitation, the petition argues the state is constitutionally required to frame a fair, reasonable relocation policy before taking coercive action that destroys the livelihood of traders who have operated lawfully for decades. No such policy has been framed.
What the Petition Asks For
Amritsar Holy City meat ban: The petition seeks quashing the December 15, 2025 notifications (both the Holy City declaration and the departmental circular), the December 23, 2025 prohibitory order, the March 24, 2026 notice and the May 8, 2026 restraint order. It alternatively seeks directions to the state to frame and implement a fair rehabilitation and relocation policy before enforcing any prohibition. It also seeks a writ of prohibition restraining the state from any further coercive action — sealing, closure, confiscation, licence cancellation — pending final disposal.
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