Farmers have total ownership of their cattle
The current tragedy of this country is those who are not domain experts have begun to give expert opinions on every issue. Those who do not even have primary knowledge of science speak about science, politicians talk about economics and street rowdies speak about dharma and culture with clubs in their hands.
RBI is the best example of how politicians with no economic knowledge have messed with the country’s systems and damaged it to a large extent. Supreme Court gives out contradicting verdicts because anti-constitutional elements decide who should disseminate justice.
Saffron-flaunting men like Yogi who do not have any experience in farming or cattle rearing, are deciding on who the cattle should be sold to, and how one would take care of them. As a result of this, dairy farming has collapsed in the rural areas and schools are turning into cow shelters.
The result of priestly class’s conspiracy to take dairy farming into their own hands by turning it into a dharmic task than an economic option, is showing on the country’s psyche. The Yogi government has been creating baseless schemes to protect the cows such as cow ambulance, cow shelters in schools, cow protection forces manned by goondas, etc.
Cattle rearing is on a downhill in Uttar Pradesh owing to the government taking away the rights of farmers who cared for these cattle. They are getting transported to slaughter houses on the sly. The cattle that are found on the streets are being tethered at schools and hospitals.
Uttar Pradesh government is basically concerned about cattle on the street instead of caring for people and their welfare. All agrarian aspects are linked to one another. Since cattle rearing and agriculture went hand in hand owing to dependency on tilling, the animals were domesticized.
The cattle waste was the best fertilizer for the land. The dung, the urine everything enriched the nutrients in the land. The returns from this could help farmers balance their maintenance costs. Now with cultivable land being less, cattle have less utility for such purposes any more since most of the agricultural activity happens based on machines and automobiles.
Just the way as the farmers were part of agriculture, even the beef consumers contributed their bit to complete the food chain and keep the economy going. The cattle that have outlived their time and utility are being given up for beef consumers.
This serves two purposes. One would be the expenses part would come down where the cattle was to be cared for even when there are no definite returns, and the second was an economical benefit that involved selling them. This money would be used to buy new cattle, and the business would grow further expanding the scope of farming.
More than this, those who worship cows are not too keen on rearing them or taking care of them. The farmers who rear cattle worship them annually as part of their paying respect to the animals that help their lives.
Cattle, to farmers, are like currency. If there are two extra cattle, the money one gets by selling them would be used for a marriage or house maintenance or anything else that would serve the purpose for the moment. This is a constant economic activity. Dairy farming is turning upside down with priestly class claiming this activity is more of a devotion than of economic one.
The farmers who were at the forefront had to move back, owing to the goondas of Sangh Parivar who took the centre stage. The Gau Rakshaks now decide who the cattle would be sold to, even beyond its owner. The act brought about by the government against selling the cattle is more like second round of demonetization.
Ironically, no one has to take care of these cattle that had gone beyond utility. They would have turned into food and provided nourishment to the society. This would have ensured nutrition to the poor.
Owing to this government policy, the poor are deprived of nutritious food. And the farmers lost the income they’d get by selling the aged cattle. All these expenses are now on the government now. The money that could have been spent for people, schools and public health and other supporting systems had to be used for creating facilities for the cattle and failed even in that.
Many cattle died owing to bad maintenance in Gaushalas which turned profitable to others, but not to the poor farmer who took care of the cattle. Dairy farming thus suffered a huge blow.
The government needs to wake up now at least and encourage beef consumption and provide impetus to dairy farming. Cattle should be declared the property of farmers who rear them, in clear and loud messaging. The money that’s being spent on Gaushala should be used for improvement of schools and hospitals. This way, both the farmers and cattle would be spared.
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Wayanad LS bypoll: Priyanka crosses lead achieved by Rahul in 2024 Lok Sabha polls
Wayanad (Kerala) (PTI): Top Congress leader Priyanka Gandhi Vadra was on Saturday comfortably cruising towards her maiden electoral win from Wayanad in Kerala, as she surpassed the lead achieved by her brother Rahul Gandhi in the 2024 Lok Sabha polls earlier this year with party leaders and ally IUML predicting a big win for her amid the counting trends.
The Congress-led UDF's candidate from this hill constituency, Priyanka, extended her lead by over 3.8 lakh votes after five hours of counting of the ballots in the Wayanad Lok Sabha bypoll, according to the Election Commission.
Reacting to the lead achieved by Priyanka, Congress' ally Indian Union Muslim League and Telangana Chief Minister A Revanth Reddy said she would get more votes than her brother Rahul Gandhi in the Lok Sabha polls in April this year and will win by a record margin.
"An amazing first trend on counting day is the massive early lead for our leader @priyankagandhi ji in Wayanad, Kerala, by-election. People of Wayanad are surely going to record in victory margins today and Priyanka ji will make Parliamentary debut with a grand win," Reddy said in a post on 'X'.
IUML supremo Panakkad Sadiq Ali Shihab Thangal said that going by the trends, Priyanka will get more votes than what Rahul got and the majority she achieves would also be higher than that of her brother.
A similar view was expressed by IUML's national general secretary P K Kunhalikutty.
On the other hand, BJP leader Anil K Antony, earlier in the day, had claimed that though Priyanka has achieved a good lead, her victory margin would be less than what Rahul got in the 2024 and 2019 LS polls in the hill constituency.
According to the latest EC figures, Priyanka had a lead of 3,82,975 with 5,78,526 votes. LDF's Sathyan Mokeri was behind her with 1,95,551 votes and NDA's Navya Haridas was in the third spot with 1,04,947 votes.
Rahul had got 6,47,445 votes and won by a margin of 3,64,422 votes against his nearest rival, CPI's Annie Raja, in the LS polls this year. In 2019, he had got 7,06,367 votes and had won by a margin of 4,31,770 votes.
After winning from Rae Bareilly in Uttar Pradesh as well, in this year's polls, Rahul vacated the Wayanad seat, and the party nominated his sister Priyanka, paving the way for her electoral debut.
The bypoll turnout in Wayanad, which has over 14 lakh registered voters, was around 65 per cent, a decline from the close to 74 per cent in the LS polls held in April this year and much lower than the over 80 per cent turnout in the hill constituency in the 2019 general elections.
The counting of votes commenced at 8 am with postal ballots being taken up first.
The strong rooms, where the EVMs were kept, were opened more than an hour before counting began.
The bypoll for the Wayanad Lok Sabha seat was held on November 13.
Of the 16 candidates who contested, the main contenders are Priyanka, ruling CPI(M)-led LDF's Sathyan Mokeri, a political veteran, and BJP-headed NDA's Navya Haridas.
