Mecca of the Sacred Cow

On a small square of muddy city land, sandwiched between a machine shop and a warehouse, stand the murky stables of Gopal Ganpat, Bombay dairyman. Inside the stables, 300 buffalo cows are jammed flank to flank, and behind the stables, fringed by manure, is the pool where Ganpat washes himself, his cows, and his milk containers. "He probably uses the same water to adulterate his milk," said a government guide to a newsman last week.

Working Cows. Ganpat's dairy is typical of the thousands which crowd India's cities--for not all of India's 176 million cattle wander the streets listlessly munching garbage and brush. Only those too old to work are turned loose. Cows are the main draft animals of India, their manure is the fuel which cooks Indian food and their milk is an important part of Indian diet. Buffalo cows, whose milk has a higher butterfat content, are the mainstay of the commercial dairy industry.

There are 50,000 milk buffalo jammed in Bombay stables. Cattle brokers, called dalals, go from farm to farm buying buffalo just before they calve, and send them to Bombay by train where they are bought by city dairymen like Ganpat. The dalals and the dairymen consider the newborn calves are expendable, and it is a common sight to see dead calves piled high outside the stables. The unpasteurized milk, sold in filthy tins, costs about twice as much as it does in New York, and Bombay's children get less than one-sixth the milk the average U.S. citizen drinks. When the cows are worn out, they are often sold, in spite of Hindu laws, to Moslem slaughterhouses.

Working Farm. To Bombay Supplies Minister, Dinkerrao Desai, the slaughter and the filthy, foolish dairy methods are horrifying. For the past two years he has directed the building of a huge modern dairy farm on the outskirts of Bombay. Just north of the city limits, Desai bought 3,500 acres of palm-covered hills at a place called Aarey (rhymes with starry). There, he has built seven self-sufficient dairy-farm units with airy, concrete stables, with scrubbed floors, neat feed bins and washing ponds filled with clear water. Hills have been leveled for grazing lands. The units now have room for 3,500 cows --the start of a project which will eventually take over all the milk buffalo now in Bombay.

Persuaded and coerced by government officials to move their cattle to the Aarey farm, the dairymen get free help from the government dairying staff and veterinarians, and cheap feed for their cattle. One other innovation: separate housing for cattle and humans; in Bombay many dairymen live in the stalls with the cattle. The government sells the milk for them at a commission, expects the project will pay for itself in 35 years. Production is on the way up in the seven farm units already operating at Aarey. Ten more units will be opened this month. Eventually, Milk Commissioner Dara Khurody, Desai's partner in the project, hopes to build an agricultural college at Aarey.

The Desai-Khurody farm shows important progress against two of India's biggest problems: malnutrition, and the misuse of its tremendous cattle population, the world's biggest. Says Khurody: "I want to make this a sort of Mecca to which pilgrims can come from all over India to learn about cow culture."

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