“How can you torture animals, just because you want to look beautiful? Animals have feelings just like any of us” says Kishore Jain of Patanjali Yog Samiti, Coimbatore, talking about the vegetarian-cosmetic mela held here recently.

“The motive of the mela was to stop the sufferings of animals meted out for a selfish reason” he says.

Sadhviji Sayampurna Sreeji Maharaj Saheb, a Jain monk, conducted a vegetarian cosmetic mela here, on Sunday.The objective behind the exhibition was to bring awareness about animal cruelty by introducing to the public “cruelty-free products” .

Companies which do not test their products on animals and those that do not use ingredients extracted from animals have set their stalls in the exhibition which was held at Shri Shankeshwar Parshwanath Jain Temple, RS Puram.

Shri Arihant Youth association, with forty volunteers, helped organising the event.Alpesh Mehta, President of Shri Arihant Youth Association told The Covai Post, “This is to bring awareness to the people about cosmetic products which are not tested on animals. There were 21 stalls in total.We wanted to let the people know about non-alcoholic deodorants and similar products. So, it was almost like a “vegetarian-products mela”.

Moreover, the exhibition even had ‘orangic food’ item stall, which had millets.The exhibition educated public how non-leather ‘Gowma’ products can be an alternative to leather products like belts, bags that are used daily. The stall owners are very happy with the response they got”.

This first of a kind exhibition in Coimbatore, has already been conducted in Bangalore and Ooty.