THE RSS and dozens of its so-called socio-cultural outfits have become very aggressive in unleashing violence during recent months since the BJP assumed power on its own under the leadership of Narender Modi. In spite of false tall promises and acute anti incumbency against the UPA-2 government, the BJP had got a mere 31 percent of the vote share. Such a narrow and too fragile political base has further eroded in the wake of mounting discontent among various sections of masses; especially the peasantry reeling under unprecedented agrarian crisis thanks to the more aggressive pursuit of neo-liberal policy framework. It is in this broad context that desperate BJP has let loose its Hindutva outfits to rake up all kinds of divisive and emotive issues related to religion or caste and cow is one among many. The cow still continues to be a symbol of worship in many regions of North Indian states regardless of the caste and even religious faith. BJP has been exploiting  the sentiments attached with the cow in the past in order to polarise the people on communal lines and also to target the Muslim minority community and even the dalits from time to time especially before the  elections.

The recent cold blooded murder of Mohd Akhlaq in Bishada village of Dadri (UP) is one such classical instance of a planned conspiracy. Rumours of presence of beef in his house were spread. Two more gruesome murders have been committed in Himachal Pradesh and Jammu and Kashmir by alleging cow slaughter. The chief minister of Haryana has publically made highly outrageous statement saying that the Muslims can stay in this country only if they stop eating beef. This is a clear infringement of the very oath he had taken while assuming office a year ago. So all these incidents and the debate around cow slaughter or beef eating must be seen as how agenda of 'development' is being sought to be replaced with cow in the ongoing Bihar elections by the BJP. These should also be seen as part of the larger context of the atmosphere of hate and intolerance being spread systematically and with arrogance. The situation therefore, warrants an objective analysis of the whole issue of cow and cattle in today's context.

The Hindi speaking region is often called cow belt because of its importance in the economy. The farm sector is dependent on bullocks as draught animal for ploughing and transportation and the cow is a source of dairy products besides producing bullocks. Hence cow has always been of central importance for farming, the main livelihood of the peasantry. Bovine rearing and breeding (both cattle and buffalo) has been and continues to be an important occupation of rural as well as section of urban masses.  So, cattle in general and cow as birth-giver to bullocks in particular, continued to be accorded a kind of worshipped status as Gau Mata. Most popular and sacred slogan among rural children had been Gau Mata ki Jai. The impact of Arya Samaj movement in these parts of the country in the context of cow worship may have been also a factor. A person swearing in the name of his real mother or Cow or bullocks was not usually disbelieved. Birth of a male calf was a sign of fortune while that of a female calf a curse. On the other hand the reverse was true in case of buffalo.   But over the years the whole scenario took a drastic change.

With very fast mechanization of the farm sector especially in the wake of'Green Revolution'tractors and other implements replaced the use of bullocks at a massive scale and these days use of bullocks as draught animal has become almost an uncommon sight in the countryside. The cow has been replaced by buffalo and bullocks by tractors . Male buffalos ( bhainsa or jhota) has fast replaced bulls even for the transportation or ploughing purpose.

Murra breed of Haryana buffalo is a most famous breed in terms of yield of milk. This is taken to even South Indian states and has become over the decades a crucial occupation of livelihood for a large segment of population in many parts of the country when the peasantry was faced with unviable situation in farming.Murra Bhainsa recently fetching a price of Rs. 6 Crore and yet not being sold by a farmer in Karnal district is one example of buffalos’ priority over cow.

During a period of four decades the population of domesticated cattle in Haryana has declined sharply from 40.9 per cent of the total bovines in 1966 to mere 14 per cent in 2007. While on the other hand that of the buffalos has increased from 50.7 per cent to 79.0 per cent during the same period. Reason being that buffalo is more economic in terms of milk yield. Average milk yield per cow is 2.9 kg while that of a buffalo is 4.6 kg with much more fat content.

Secondly, the indigenous( Desi ) cows which had been a traditional cattle has been further replaced by either the Cross bred , the famous Sahiwal or the Jersey or the Holstein Freezer.  So the left out Desi cows remain further marginalised as domestic animal yet continue to breed by Desi Bulls. It is actually this population of the cows that are main part of the stray cattle and become a big menace as threatfor crops in the villages and for general people in the urban areas being a big cause of road road accidents. Interestingly, it is this cow which is most neglected and yet ‘worshiped’too. These cows are camped in large number of  Gau shalas(cow shelters) which have become a flourishing business for some vested interests. People donate very generously to gaushala committees and during recent decades even state governments too give very liberal grants to the those run by registeted bodies. Here the managers would readilyaccept stray cows only if handsome amount of money is offered in lieu of keeping the animal. But if it is a milch cow it is retained while  if dry it is sure to be let loose again by the management often during night hours.

In spite of the marginalization of its utility the population of these stray cows and bulls continue to grow causing very serious problem for the common people. Several commuters loose their lives or get seriously injured in road accidents caused by stray cattle squattingon roads causingfrequent accidents. The bulls in rural areas not only damage crops but also violently harm the pregnant valuable buffalos resulting in abortions.

There are reports of clashes taking place between residents of one village with the neighbouring villages over movement of stray cattle from one village to another as no one is the owner. Curiously, on this point there is a conflict of interest between farmers whose crops are threatened by the stray cattle on the one hand and the so called Gaubhakats thriving their communal politics on the other.

With lakhs of neglected cattle  there is bound to be morehigher mortalityrate among the stray cattlefor multiple reasons of disease, hunger, cold or accidents. Such dead or injured cows are often made a communal issue for targeting minority community or dalits.

Cattle fares have long ago been stopped wothout any valid reason. So any one transporting the cattle becomes target of communal out-fits existing in various names and masquerading as Gau- Bhakats who allegethat these were being transported for slaughter. Even the policeacts in active collusion with these elements among whom there are extortionist gangs too. The infamous Dulina episode is still fresh in the memory when five innocent dalit youth were lynched by a communally motivated mob after snatching them from the police custody in 2002 near Jhajjar town of Haryana.

All India Kisan Sabha (AIKS) has been agitating  in various states for a curb on the stray cattle. Farmers have been demanding that these cattle can be controlled by improving their breed, restoring the cattle fares, keeping the stray cattle in gaushalas, curbing the communal elements etc.But with the BJP coming to power in at the Centre and Haryana cow has been made an issue to be politically exploited more aggressively.But priorities of the BJP governments are different. Haryana assembly has enacted a legislation Haryana Gauvansh Sanrakshan and Samvardhan Act on March 16, 2015 which among other measures of so called protection also stipulates imprisonment on causing harm or slaughtering a cattle. It also provides for NGOs who could be given village common lands for setting up Gaushalas apart from getting liberal grants by the government. Following this vested interests with RSS connections and political patronage have become active for grabbing the village common lands in the name of cow. Let it be recalled that village common lands have a one-third statutary share of scheduled caste households for cultivation or allotment as house sites for the landless.

A few month ago an official seminar was held on the plight of Gau Vansha at Rohtak Maharishi Dayanand University where Minister of Agriculture O.P.Dhankhar was prominently present and lot of so called religious Babas and sawamis adorned the dias. One of the major policy announcement made by the Minister was that 50 per cent subsidy to be granted to those setting up a dairy of Desi Cows.  How ridiculous and senseless it is . But there is hardly any logic when it is a matter of exploiting the sentiments of people. The cross- bred may well give much more milk  than the Desi cow but it does not qualify to be given recognition as Gau-Mata like the stray lot of Desi or indigenous ones.

Cow and bulls can accrue political dividends being tools to be exploited for communal mobilization, as long as these fateful hoards are rendered in abundance consuming polythene bags and stinking waste on roads in towns. Once their population is controlled through various means like  more gaushalas or improving their breed, obviously there would be no stray cattles and Hindutva fundamentalists would be bereaved of a potent political weapon to be used for communal polarisation aimed at consolidation of their rule and electoral dividends in various elections.