T he ‘gaumata’ will be saved, and it will probably be her bowel movements that does it. Giving ideology a backseat, employees at the Kanpur Gaushala Society (KGS) are getting their hands dirty churning out products from cow dung and urine. It’s their own cow-and-bull story, and it’s out to prove that the bovines make economic sense, and hence deserve protection. The KGS, closely linked to Hindu nationalist organs RSS and BJP, recorded a turnover of Rs 2 crore last fiscal, proving that what goes out really has a market.

The KGS product profile now ranges from mosquito coils to aftershave lotions, from face packs to phenyl. But it is their newest offering, released earlier this year, that has really put them on the map. Goloka Pay is a cold drink concentrate laced with distilled cow urine (five per cent of total volume!) which is doing reasonably well in the market. The idea of creating a soft drink first came when Baba Ramdev lashed out at Coke and Pepsi (reportedly their sales plummeted after the rebuke)....