New Delhi: Hours before the highly anticipated ‘Howdy Modi’ event in Houston, Texas, a collaboration to promote cow-based entrepreneurship and research on India’s indigenous cows was announced, according to a report in Times of India.
The University of California, Davis, and the Ganpat University of Mehsana are to sign a pact and seek ways to encourage startups that focus on cow-based products like milk, dung and urine. The development of cow breeds will be an area of focus as well.
“A new chapter will be added to the annals of economic progress by venturing into cow-based entrepreneurship,” the chairman of the Rashtriya Kamdhenu Aayog Vallabh Kathiria, who was in Houston to attend the ‘Howdy Modi’ event, told TOI. “Prime Minister Narendra Modi will add a new chapter to the history of Indo-US political ties.”
Speaking to TOI, Kathiria also stressed that the tie-up between the two universities to improve India’s indigenous cow breeds, with the principal focus on Gir cows, was a first.
Kathiria said that he would also urge the Indian diaspora in the US to invest in cow-based startups.
He added that he and his team had recently met faculty members and students from UC Davis and had discovered that cow-rearing practices in California and Gujarat were similar.
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Kathiria, who was a minister of state in the Vajpayee government, has previously held the post of the former chief of the Gujarat Gau Sewa (Gujarat Cow Service) and Gauchar Vikas Board (Pasture Land Board).
In February this year, stressing that “the current government would not hesitate to support gau mata“, then Union finance minister Piyush Goyal allocated Rs 500 crore in the interim budget for the setting up of the Rashtriya Kamdhenu Aayog. The purported aim of the body was to facilitate the effective implementation of laws and welfare schemes for cows, ensure that cows remain productive for farmers and encourage them not to abandon their cows after their economic use is over.
Previously, Kathiria had said that startups focusing on “commercialising” cow by-products like dung and urine, apart from dairy, would be eligible to receive funding from the government for up to 60% of their initial investment.
He had also proposed that the Rashtriya Kamdhenu Aayog provide retired military and paramilitary personnel with cows to help them earn a post-retirement livelihood. “We will give cows to former defence and paramilitary personnel and will provide a subsidy if they want to set up gaushalas,” Kathiria told TOI.
Kathiria has also advocated for increased research on panchgavya (cow milk, ghee, urine, dung and curd) and has held that ‘gau raksha activities’ (cow protection or vigilantism) be incentivised on a national scale.
According to a TOI report, in October 2017, Kathiria had written to Modi demanding the creation of a ‘Gau Mantralaya’ or a ministry for cow protection. He also demanded that cows be allotted to defence personnel and that ex-armymen be assigned to operate on new military farms set up on the PPP model.
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Katharia reasoned that instead of assigning seven acres of land to former defence and paramilitary personnel, which the government presently does, retired military personnel could be given a cow which would help them earn a living.
Elaborating further on avenues of entrepreneurship available in the cow-based business, Kathiria told TOI, “We will make a provision that former defence and paramilitary personnel get a subsidy if they want to set up a gaushala. I will also propose research on panchgavya, which will help in the socio-economic development of the country and in the conservation of cows.”
In July, the Rashtriya Kamdhenu Aayog had identified states like Haryana, Uttar Pradesh, Rajasthan, Gujarat, Maharashtra, Karnataka, Kerala and Goa to promote cow-based tourism and carve out a route for students, researchers and tourists from foreign countries “to promote our indigenous breeds” and promote the cow-based economy while products made from cow including ghee, urine and dung would be sold at tourist places.