Video of Goat Sacrifice Near Madurai Meenakshi Temple Viral With False Communal Claim

In the video, a person speaking in Hindi near the temple identifies the location as Meenakshi Amman temple. He then says, “They are slaughtering meat; I’m not sure if it’s a goat or a cow. It’s happening very close to the temple. I am not sure, how this has been allowed.” The video, shared by the X account Voice of Hindus, also asks for action to be taken.

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BOOM found that this claim is false and the animal was a goat that was donated to the temple, as part of a ritual.

Fact-check

BOOM was able to identify the person in the video as Samiyadi Sivaraman, a Hindu shaman (a spiritual practitioner) from Madurai. We reached out to Sivaraman to confirm whether the animal in the video was a cow or a goat.

Sivaraman's wife told BOOM, "We have been doing this for a long time as annadhanam (donating food to people in need). He (Sivaraman) was cleaning the goat for that.”

She added that devotees offer donations and with those contributions, he prepares goat meat and serves food to people every year.

She also mentioned, "There have been false rumors about this for the past few days. This is a regular food donation we do."

TN Fact Check, the official account of the Fact Check Unit of the government of Tamil Nadu also debunked the claim on X. It clarified that the video captures goat sacrifice. According to the fact check, the incident happened on February 7, 2025, when Sivaraman, performed a goat sacrifice and distributed the offerings to devotees as part of his annual ritual.

This video was first fact-checked by Newschecker.