'They also had no intentions to raise racial or religious tensions by using the cow's head as accused by certain groups lately,' he told a press conference after the meeting.

The residents said their protest was 'hijacked' by political activists from different parties.

Hossein said the organisers of the protest had 'not realised that someone had brought a cow's head to the demonstration until the last minute'.

He added it was not the first instance that irresponsible parties had resorted to using the heads of animals in protests.

The incident had prompted Prime Minister Najib Tun Razak to order authorities to handle the situation with care.

The Hindus form a bulk of the nearly two million ethnic population that is about eight percent of the Malaysian population of 28 million.