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Self-reliance is priceless and delicious

Self Reliance
Amul Girl - Amul brand mascot


The year was 1946. Dairy farmers from a couple of villages in Gujarat supplied milk to a company. The company processed the milk and sold it to the Bombay Government, which then distributed to consumers in Bombay. The company made a lot of money but paid the farmers way less. Farmers sought help from Sardar Vallabhai Patel. Farmers protested and demanded that the Bombay Government buy milk directly from them. The government didn’t budge and so farmers halted the milk supply for 15 days. Bombay went without a drop of milk for 15 days. The Bombay government finally gave in and accepted the farmers' demand.

 

Farmers from villages set up milk union and started milk processing plants. Farmers dropped in their daily milk produce to a village collection centre. Milk quality was tested right there at collection points and sent to processing plants. More and more villages joined the union and district level collection centres cropped up. Milk Union managed everything right from collection, processing, packaging and marketing. Cooperative Milk Society was born, owners are dairy farmers. Farmers elect representatives from among themselves to manage and run the cooperative society. Farmers are paid right at the collection centre when they drop the milk. For every Rs.1 of milk sold, farmers get Rs. 0.8. Their products are marketed under the name “Amul”, from Sanskrit Amulya. Amulya means priceless, invaluable.

 

India was milk-deficient in the 1950s. Cooperative Milk model was replicated across many states in India. It was a revolution, the White Revolution. Karnataka’s Nandini, Tamil Nadu’s Aavin, Kerala’s Milma milk cooperatives were established. India is now self-sufficient in milk production. India is the world’s largest producer of milk and it is nearly twice that of the second-ranked milk producing nation, US. Self-reliance is priceless. Self-reliance is also utterly, butterly delicious.

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  1. Unknown17 July 2020 at 11:24

    Nice touch at the end:-). I am interested to know what happened when the Gujarat farmers complained to the iron man of India.

    ReplyDelete

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