Finally, the Holy Cow interview

The Rashtriya Godhan Cowherd Mahasangh held its annual summit last week from November 5 to 9 at a stadium near India Gate Delhi It was attended by policymakers dairy experts and gaushala representatives along with an exhibition of cowbased products like panchagavya made from pure cow dung cow urine milk yoghurt and ghee The event was so epic that Mr Balaram Pani Dean of Colleges of Delhi University long regarded as a bastion of free speech spoke up loudly sending a memo on October 31 to principals encouraging students and faculty members to attend this groundbreaking conferenceTo make sure that there were no distractions the university cancelled a scheduled seminar on Land Property and Democratic Rights part of a university lecture series that has been running for six decades How could that possibly be more vital to the national interest than the welfare of cowsIn 2031 thanks to the huge investments made in researching every aspect of this sacred animal we learned that holy cows can communicate using a sophisticated language close to telepathy It also came out that all cows are thoroughly conversant with Sanskrit It was a matter of time before the worldrsquos first university for the higher education of cows was opened the Gomata Mahavidhyalay on a campus near Varanasi I was privileged to have the firstever interview with a holy cow this one the Dean of Colleges at said university I spoke to her as she grazed peacefully occasionally snortingldquoIf cows are holy why do we exploit them so muchrdquo I asked ldquoWe take all their milk their urine and their dung Do we call cows holy just to make them feel goodrdquoLetrsquos talk about Bombai Click the QR code above to join my WhatsApp group to share your Bombai stories for my bookmdashand perhaps answer some of my Bombai questionsldquoAll wrong Mr Grdquo said the cow ldquoOnly certain Indian cows the ones with humps are considered holy Specifically they include the breeds called Ongole Gir Sahiwal Haryanvi Kankrej Red Sindhi Rathi Lalkandhari Gangatiri Hallikar Ponwar Nimari Golao Vechur and Deoni Theyrsquore the ones with humps called zebu cows The rest are just well unholy cowsrdquoldquoButmdashrdquo I beganThe cow burped ldquoIndians worship all cows just to be safe I bet you couldnrsquot tell an Ongole from a Deoni or HallikarrdquoldquoWhatrsquos the big deal with the hump thenrdquo I askedldquoAh thatrdquo she said swishing flies away with her tail ldquoLike Indian farmers zebu are designed to survive weeks and months of hot dry spells with no rain drawing on food and water stored in their humps They also stop lactating and some become barrenrdquoldquoYou donrsquot say marsquoamrdquo I saidldquoLittle factoid about the milkrdquo she continued ldquoHoly cows produce less than half the milk Indians drink Indiarsquos source of steady highquality milk is the female water buffalo whose milk has higher butterfat contentrdquoldquoShould the female water buffalo also be holy thenrdquoldquoUno momentordquo she said ldquoThe real reason why cow slaughter is banned is that cows produce calves some of which will become bulls Castrated bulls are oxen the single most important animal for the Indian farmerTheyrsquore docile trainable safer to handle and incredibly rugged and strong Without his oxen the farmer is finished Theyrsquore his tractor thresher and family car combinedrdquoldquoSo oxen are also holyrdquoldquoNordquo said Madame Cow ldquoItrsquos the cow that is holy because she produces the bulls that can be turned into oxen Oxen are just the labour class to be exploitedrdquoI must have looked blank because she continued ldquoLet me explain again In a drought cows become dry and barren and many poor farmers kill them off rather than struggle to feed them But herersquos a little secret mdash many of those cows will become fertile again once the rains come and resume producing calvesrdquoldquoCalling them holy prevents their slaughterrdquo I said as light dawned ldquoBut wait mdash wouldnrsquot this mean that ageing unproductive cows also surviverdquoThe old lady released a gust of methane ldquoHoly cows may not be slaughtered But this ruling applies only to cardcarrying Hindusrdquo she said cryptically ldquoAs we say in Sanskrit Tvam ganitam karoshi You do the mathrdquoldquoI get it A farmer could tether an old or barren cow and let it starve to deathrdquoBurpldquoOr yoke a calf with a wooden triangle that would irritate the motherrsquos udder so much that she would kick it to deathrdquoBurpldquoOr quietly drive useless cows across the border to Bangladesh at night knowing they would be skinned cooked and converted into bagsrdquoldquoYoursquore very cleverrdquo said the grand old bovine ldquoAre you sure yoursquore not a cowrdquoA final question came to me ldquoBut whatrsquos even holy about yourdquoldquoNothing We werenrsquot holy 4000 years agordquo said Her Bovine Majesty ldquoHindus used to slaughter us for sacrifice and eat us happily at ceremonial feasts hosted by Brahmin priests By 200 AD only rich people were allowed to eat us Now itrsquos banned for all Hindus mdash and thank God Wersquore in a good place today I mean imagine if theyrsquod decided goats were holyrdquoldquoI get itrdquo I said getting itldquoYou probably donrsquotrdquo said Madame Cow ldquoBut as an ancient sage said Arthavyavastha eva murkhah mdash Itrsquos the economy stupidrdquoYou can reach C Y Gopinath at cygopigmailcomSend your feedback to mailbagmiddaycomThe views expressed in this column are the individualrsquos and donrsquot represent those of the paper