India’s Dairy Industry Built On ‘Reproduction, Extraction, And Disposal,’ Finds Report

A new report has said that India’s dairy industry is built on “reproduction, extraction, and disposal.”

The report documents the links between the Indian dairy, beef, and leather sectors, thereby providing an overview of the national industry’s lifecycle.

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“The Indian Dairy Truth Report” was published in February. A team of animal rights activists led by Shivam Nandi at Voice of Vegans produced the report.

It is based primarily on publicly available data, government sources, and documented practices, but also includes some primary data sources and reporting. According to the team, the report challenges the myth of “Ahimsa milk” in India.

Ahimsa, which means harm avoidance, is used in this context to describe milk that is, in theory, taken only from well-looked-after cows who are not forcibly impregnated, separated from their calves, abandoned, or slaughtered afterwards.

As noted in the report, these are all standard practices throughout the animal farming industry. Since cows do not produce milk unless pregnant, they are forcibly impregnated over and over again. Their calves are separated to “divert milk for sale,” and the cows are eventually sold, abandoned, or slaughtered.

According to the report, India does not have a single national law banning cow slaughter, and regional restrictions primarily apply to indigenous cows only, not all bovines. Buffaloes, crossbred cows, and mithuns (also known as “cattle of the mountain”) make up more than 53 percent of India’s total bovine population and contribute over 73 percent of its milk, and their slaughter is mostly legal.

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‘One cannot exist without the other’

India’s meat industry is, notably, the single biggest exporter of beef in the world.

The 2023 film Maa Ka Doodh, made by doctor-turned-activist Harsha Atmakuri, also focuses on the gap between perception and reality when it comes to beef and dairy in India, which Atmakuri previously described as “two sides of the same coin.”

“One cannot exist without the other,” he said at the time. “To be more precise, beef in India cannot exist without the dairy industry.”

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