The greatness of a nation and its moral progress can be judged by the way in which its animals are treated” – Mahatma Gandhi.

Starting 2014, the ‘cow’ became the national issue, ‘gaurakshaks’ became the dreaded reality and ‘cow vigilantism’ saw the affairs of the nation take an unprecedented turn with the number of cow-related lynchings it brought with it.

The BharatiyaJanata Party (BJP) aka the protectors of the cows, maintained a stoic silence with regards to the death of 44 people, who died in cow-related violence between May 2015 and December 2018.

Nobody from the Hindutva preaching, fascist right-wing party condemned the lynchings at the hands of caste-supremacist, vile, inhuman men who ran amok on the streets of the country beating up minorities – Muslims and Dalits – in the name of illegal cattle trading and beef consumption.

Notwithstanding that the largest beef exporting companies in the country are owned by Hindus, the BJP has not only worked to instill fear among the cattle traders, it has also given the Border Security Force (BSF) the charge of ending the smuggling of India’s holy cows to Bangladesh that thrived along outposts near the Indo-Bangladesh border.

In August, the BSF had 2700 cattle that they didn’t know what to do about in their custody out of more than 19,000 seized by them this year itself.

The result?

The slow death of the livestock at the hands of the BSF.

A letter to the National Human Rights Commission (NHRC), Kirity Roy, Secretary of the Banglar Manabadhikar Suraksha Mancha (MASUM) and National Convenor (PACTI) Programme Against Custodial Torture & Impunity; mentioned that the “BSF personnel of Khandua BSF Border Outpost, had seized around 350 buffaloes before 9th October 2019, that were about to be smuggled across the border and kept them in custody for a prolonged period of time without food, water and other basic necessities. As a result several buffaloes are getting killed every day”.

Khandua, which is situated at the banks of the river Padma faces severe restrictions from the BSF for being close to the international border of the Lagola area in Murshidabad. With incidents of cattle smuggling being commonplace, it is good that the BSF has worked towards the riddance of this menace.

However, in a show of extreme animal cruelty, it is now treating the animals inhumanely by not providing them with any food or water and kept under direct sunlight with no shelter, leaving for them to die a slow death.

The letter further says, “Even after the death of the animals, the BSF personnel are not taking any proper action to disperse the corpse but rather paying the villagers to take away the dead animal and throw it into the river in an inhuman way. River and water-bodies are being polluted by the act of BSF. The locals are being paid rupees 500 for dispersing the dead animal. They tie the head of the dead animal to their tractor and drag them through the villages to the Padma River. These incidents inflict shock in the villagers, especially children. The dead animals are either thrown into the river or on the river banks. Keeping aside the inhumane act of the BSF towards the animals, it is also a fact that the perpetrators are severely contributing to the environmental pollution by randomly disposing off the dead animals into the river and river banks. It is also unsettling that why the BSF is keeping them in custody under such adverse conditions and not selling the cattle in auctions, which could on the one hand bring income for the government.”

Will the BSF be punished?

Will the government pull up the BSF for violating Section 11 (i) under Prevention of Cruelty to Animals Act, 1960 that states acts of torture against animals causing unnecessary pain or suffering is punishable under law and the Sections 428 and 429 of the Indian Penal Code (IPC), which states that anyone responsible for maiming or killing an animal will be punished under law. The random polluting of the river by the BSF also violates the Goal numbers 3, 15 and16 of Sustainable Development Goal earmarked by United Nations and the government of India is a party and have agreement in this international instruments.

What animal rights activists demand

Ms. JaleshaBawa, on the behalf of the villagers has lodged a written complaint against the cruel actions of the BSF to the Superintendent of Police, Murshidabad district on October 10, 2019, but in vain.

PLEASE PUT THE PHOTO OF THE LETTER TO THE POLICE AND THE RECIEPT HERE

In the letter addressed to the NHRC, Roy has demanded that apart from the gruesome murder of these animals being investigated, the guilty officials of the BSF and the Commandant of BSF battalion no. 78, Company Commander of Khandua BOP under 78 BN BSF should be prosecuted under  a) Water (Prevention & Control of Pollution) Act, 1974 (as amended in 1988), b) Air (Prevention & Control of Pollution) Act, 1981, c) Environmental (Protection) Act, 1986 and d) Wildlife Protection Act, 1972 must be booked and persecuted for their crime.

He has also asked they cease the disposal of the dead livestock into rivers and has implored the government to rescue these animals and auction them for sale as per the Supreme Court guidelines.

Given that the killing of cattle became a national controversy under the BJP government, will the nationalist party now pull up one of its own for the disrespect to these animals or will they be let go because it was buffaloes who were killed and not the ‘holy’ cows?

Related:

Cow smuggling case against Pehlu Khan quashed: Rajasthan HC

Hindu Vigilantes Push Rajasthan’s Cow Trade Into Decline

Rohtak: Cow vigilantes beat up Muslim dairy worker, police chain him instead of treating his wounds

The post The BSF have left the 300 plus livestock to die a slow death appeared first on SabrangIndia.

Image courtesy Jaideep Hardikar/People’s Archive of Rural India

Prahlad Dhoke is trying to save his cows. But to do that, he’ll have to let his three-acre guava orchard die.

“It’s a trade off,” says the 44-year-old, in tears, standing before rows of 7 to 8-foot high guava plants. “I’ve expended everything, my savings, gold… But now I can’t buy more water every day to save my plants. I chose to save my cows. It’s a hard choice.”

Cows are hard to buy again once sold, and in early April a cattle camp came up just outside his village, Vadgaon Dhok in Beed district,  as part of the Maharashtra government’s drought relief measures. Prahlad’s 12 cows, including two Gir cows that he had bought from a local market for Rs. 1 lakh each, have been shifted to the camp. But giving up the plants means irreparable losses too.

“My eldest brother had gone to Lucknow four years ago,” he says, “he brought guava saplings from there.” It took Prahlad and his family four years to raise the orchard. But one really bad monsoon in 2018 after years of recurring drought and growing water scarcity in the arid Marathwada region, was a challenge he could not meet.

While some tehsils in the state witness drought and scarcity every year, a severe pan-regional water scarcity started in Marathwada in the 2012-13 agricultural season (a failed 2012 monsoon triggered scarcity in the summer of 2013), followed by 2014-15 and now 2018-19. While every summer brings water scarcity, since 2012,  Marathwada has reported a growing meteorological drought (failure of monsoon), agricultural drought (failure of kharif and rabi crops), and hydrological drought (groundwater depletion).

Vadgaon Dhok village is in Georai tehsil, one of the 151 tehsils declared drought-hit by the Maharashtra government in October 2018. Georai recorded less than 50 per cent rainfall from June to September 2018 –  just 288 mm against the long-term average of 628 mm in that period – according to data of the Indian Meteorological Department. In September, a crucial month for crops, the rainfall was a mere 14.2 mm against the average of 170 mm.

The water tank for cattle on Pahlad Dhoke’s farm is completely dry | Image courtesy Jaideep Hardikar/People’s Archive of Rural India

He has moved his 12 animals to a cattle camp in Georai tehsil | Image courtesy Jaideep Hardikar/People’s Archive of Rural India

Aurangabad division as a whole, with the eight districts that comprise Marathwada, recorded around 488 mm rainfall against its long-term average of 721 mm from June to September 2018. In September, the region received barely 24 mm (or 14 per cent) rainfall against the long-term average of 177 mm for that month.

The poor 2018 monsoon meant a poor kharif harvest in October-December, and no rabi harvest in February March this year. Though Dhoke had spent around Rs. 5 lakhs on a drip-water system and on deepening his four dug wells (using some of his savings, borrowing from a local agriculture cooperative and a private bank), nothing worked.

Prahlad, his two brothers and father together own 44 acres; 10 of these are in his name. The family’s entire land is dry and arid. On an acre, three years ago, Prahlad had planted mogra – the fragrant summer flower. “We made good returns from flowers,” he says, “but all those returns went into our farm.” And now the mogratoo has now dried up.

In the last 15 years, as the water scarcity in the region has deepened, so have Dhoke’s efforts to counter it. He has tried different crops, diversified techniques, given up planting sugarcane, invested in irrigation systems. But, he says, every year, the aggravating water crisis keeps testing his capabilities.

Dhoke’s mogra plants on an acre of his farm have dried up, as has his three-acres gauva orchard that he raised for four years | Image courtesy Jaideep Hardikar/People’s Archive of Rural India

Dhoke’s mogra plants on an acre of his farm have dried up, as has his three-acres gauva orchard that he raised for four years | Image courtesy Jaideep Hardikar/People’s Archive of Rural India

Prahlad’s four dug wells went dry in November 2018. From January through April this year, he bought water at least twice a week – but a 5,000-litre tanker that cost Rs. 500 rose to Rs. 800 (and was expected to climb to Rs. 1,000 by the end of May).

Water tankers are a common sight here throughout the year, and more so in the summers. Marathwada is part of the Deccan region that rests on hard basalt rock. This means not enough rainwater percolates into the ground and groundwater aquifers don’t recharge enough. The region is also in the ‘rain-shadow’ zone, with rainfall that usually does not exceed 600 mm.

In Georai taluka though, intermittent sugarcane fields (some landowners have still-working wells, others keep buying tanker water) stand in contrast to vast stretches of barren land. Farms along the Godavari river in this region also have standing orchards of grape and other fruits, as well as green fodder crops. But further away from the river, on the upper plateau of the Deccan, the vast dry swathes don’t show any signs of green life.

“I bought water for about three months,” Prahlad says, “but I ran out of money.” He decided not to incur high-interest loans from private moneylenders (since he would not have got bank loans to buy water) to save his wilting guava orchard. “Rs. 800 for 5,000 litres! It’s simply not feasible. No one in our village has that kind of money,” he says. “I will end up in debt and like my plants I too won’t survive.” 

‘Sama-dukkhi’ (co-sufferers): Walmik Bargaje and Prahlad Dhoke of Vadgaon Dhok at a cattle camp near their village | Image courtesy Jaideep Hardikar/People’s Archive of Rural India

‘Sama-dukkhi’ (co-sufferers): Walmik Bargaje and Prahlad Dhoke of Vadgaon Dhok at a cattle camp near their village | Image courtesy Jaideep Hardikar/People’s Archive of Rural India

In April, after trying to save his guava orchard from drying up, Dhoke gave up. He is now waiting for the rains. But by the time it rains in June, his orchard will have wilted, unable to withstand the summer heat.The 1,100 fully grown guava plants would have fetched Prahlad between Rs. 10 and Rs. 20 lakhs in the coming winter – guava plants yield fruits in the fourth or fifth year after sowing. After all expenses, he would have made a robust profit. Some plants bore small fruit, but the heat turned them as black as dry charcoal. “Look at these,” he says, walking through fallen dry leaves holding a branch with dried fruits, “they just did not sustain.”

Like Dhoke, many in Marathwada are battling a deepening water crisis  “Across Beed, and certainly in this tehsil, there was no kharif crop and no rabi too,” says 55-year-old Walmik Bargaje, a ‘sama-dukkhi’ (co-sufferer), as Dhoke puts it. Bargaje owns five acres and had planted coconut on half an acre. Those plants dried up. He gave up trying to cultivate sugarcane some time ago because of the water crisis. In June-July 2018, he had planted soyabean, which did not yield any returns, he says. And with no rabi sowing, he could not grow jowar and bajra, which he usually cultivates as fodder for his cattle.

In Beed district, as of June 3 this year, 933 cattle camps have been approved, of which only 603 are  functional, with 4,04,197 animals, according to the Aurangabad Divisional Commissionerate. Aurangabad division’s eight districts have a total of 750 operational cattle camps though 1,140 have been granted approval, the data show. Parbhani, Nanded and Latur districts don’t have a single cattle camp, either approved or operating. 

Across Maharashtra over a million cattle heads are being given water and fodder in 1,540 cattle camps in 10 worst drought-affected districts, according to the information available at the state’s Department of Revenue.

Dhoke blames the BJP-led government in Maharashtra for many things, but most of all because he says the state government discriminated between its supporters and critics. “Villagers who are close to the BJP got loan waivers and fresh loans,” he alleges, “I did not get it because I have been a supporter of the rival party. I see the same treatment in distribution of drought relief.”

Prahlad and his wife Deepika, a farmer and homemaker, have three children – Dnyaneshwari has completed Class 12, Narayan is in Class 10, while the youngest son, Vijay, has started Class 7. “Tyanna shikavnar bagha me [I will educate them],” he says. But he has been unable to pay Vijay’s school fee (of around Rs. 20,000 for the 2018-19 academic session in a local private school) due to which his results have been stalled. “This past week one of my cows has been ailing,” he says. “I had to spend a lot of money on its treatment.”

Prahlad with his youngest son Vijay, who school fees are pending because the family is struggling to juggle their finances | Image courtesy Jaideep Hardikar/People’s Archive of Rural India

The act of balancing the expenses is exhausting – keeping his livestock alive along with juggling his family’s needs. “These are hard times,” he says, “but I know these will pass.”

Meanwhile, across Marathwada, tanks, surface water storage, small and medium dams, dug wells and borewells are all slowly drying up. As the summer peaks, for thousands, it’s a daily desperation for water in this belt. Many Marathwada families have migrated to Aurangabad, Pune or Mumbai, or are preparing to leave. Fishing communities are reeling, as are pastoralists with livestock.

Prahlad says he has not slept in days. He hasn’t visited his orchard, around a kilometre from his house, in days too, and flits between the cattle camp and his home across the highway. “I work for 16 hours a day,” he says, walking through his forlorn farm. But what do you do, he wonders, when you just run out of money and water.

Courtesy: Indian Cultural Forum

The post Prahlad’s Painful Choice: Cows or Guavas? appeared first on SabrangIndia.

 
Spurred by rising incomes, a growing population and changing food preferences, the demand for milk and milk products will grow to at least 210 million tonnes by 2021–22, a rise of 36% over five years, according to government estimates. To meet this demand, production must grow by 5.5% per annum, according to the State of India’s Livelihood (SOIL) report. In 2014-15 and 2015-16, milk production grew at 6.2% and 6.3%, respectively.

To boost milk yield, India would need to generate 1,764 million tonnes of fodder by 2020, according to an IndiaSpend analysis of government data. But existing sources can only manage about 900 million tonnes of fodder–a shortage of 49%.
 
Demand for private consumption has risen from 5% per annum in the period 1998-2005 to 8.5% per annum between 2005 and 2012, according to an Indian Institute of Management, Bangalore, report.
 
This demand and supply gap has pushed up milk prices by an average of 16% per annum, according to the according to the 2015 SOIL report.

 
States with top milk yields have more pastures
 
In the decade to 2015, milk production went up 59% from 92 million tonnes to 146 million tonnes in 2015. But fodder shortages may knock India off its position as the world’s top milk producer (it contributes nearly 17% of global production).
 
The milk productivity of India’s livestock is less than half (48%) of the global average: 987 kg per lactation compared to the global average of 2,038 kg per lactation.
 
The availability and quality of fodder has a direct bearing on the quantity and quality of milk productivity, the data show. All the three states that topped milk productivity in terms of gram per day–Rajasthan (704), Haryana (877) and Punjab (1,032)–had earmarked more than 10% of their cultivable land for pastures, according to the 2015 SOIL report. The national average is 337.
 
Currently, all three types of fodder are in short supply–green (63%), dry (24%) and concentrates (76%). Only 4% of total cultivable land in India is used for fodder production, a proportion that has remained stagnant for the last four decades.
 

 
Considering the demand for milk, land under fodder production needs to be doubled, according to this December 2016 report of the Parliamentary Committee on Agriculture.
 
Shortages are forcing states to now source fodder from elsewhere. “The quality of fodder is a concern. We are now looking to source fodder from Varanasi (Uttar Pradesh),” said Sudhir Mishra, who runs a dairy farm in Ranchi (Jharkhand).
 
But major portions of grazing lands have either been degraded or encroached upon, according to the Parliamentary Committee report.
 
However, the availability of crop residues, the largest single source of fodder, has been impacted by increasing pressure on land and the replacement of traditional cereal crops, especially coarse ones. Crop residue includes coarse and fine straws, leguminous and pulses straws.
 
Given the importance of food and cash crops, it is very unlikely that the area under fodder cultivation will increase substantially, the parliamentary committee report said.
 
“If India fails to achieve substantial production growth, the country would need to resort to significant imports from the world market which has the potential to cause prices to spurt since India is a large consumer,” said 2015 SOIL report

 
To cut costs, easy access to fodder is important for small farmers
 
Feed cost constitutes about 60-70% of operating expenses on dairy farms. Nearly 70% of India’s milk production comes from small and marginal farmers, who depend on homegrown fodder. Unlike big operators like Mishra, they cannot afford to buy fodder from other states.
 
Take the case of Dundappa Patil, a 10th-class pass from Belagavi in North Karnataka, who took a loan of Rs 35,000 for dairy farming eight years ago.
 
The process of applying and getting a loan for the enterprise was simple and quick because Patil was covered by a scheme for unemployed youth in Karnataka. He went through a crash course in dairy farming in Belagavi and in less than a month, set up business with four buffalo.
 
Patil’s target was to sell 20 litres of milk every day to a local co-operative society. But the yield per buffalo on Patil’s farm was less than 2 litres a day; his buffalo produced less than half the milk he hoped they would.
 
“I realised that just buying a good buffalo was not enough, quality and quantity of fodder too had to be good,” he said. “You have to be ready to spend a lot of time and money on sourcing fodder.”
 
Patil said he and other villagers were using a common pasture on a hill 5 km from the village. “But that is seasonal and not enough for the all the village cattle,” he said.
 
So, he tried buying the fodder, but then the business did not look viable.
 
The contribution of livestock to the incomes of landless and small farmers ranges between 20-50%, and the poorer the family, the greater the potential of dairy farming’s contribution to livelihood, according to the SOIL report.
 
Unlike agriculture, which tends to be seasonal, dairy farming provides returns through the year. It can minimise the risks agricultural households face when they run short of cash.
 
In Belgavi, that scenario did not work for Patil because he could not overcome the fodder shortage–an issue India must address if it is to be self-sufficient in milk and dairy farming is to succeed.
 
Eventually, after a year, Patil sold the buffalo and repaid half the loan. The bank waived the rest after failing to recover it. Today, he is a construction worker in Belagavi city.
 
(Patil is the founder of 101Reporters.com, a pan-India network of grassroots reporters.)

This article was first published on IndiaSpend
 

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