Pride of Cows provides 10,000 liters daily to customers through its subscription service in Mumbai and nearby Pune, including five-star hotels and a French crêperie called Suzette. The milk costs about 75 rupees ($1.24) a liter, almost double the rate for pasteurized milk at a neighborhood store.

Pride of Cows reaches customers much the same way a new winery or brewery might. The company regularly attends food exhibitions and invites potential or existing customers to the farm for guided tours. Pride of Cows has also expanded its outreach into schools, mostly private, hosting workshops on nutrition and enrolling 150 students for a planned 45-day internship this summer through which participants “will get hands-on experience in the various aspects of Pride of Cows’ business operations,” according to a company spokeswoman.

The Parisian who runs Suzette, Jérémie Sabbagh, said he tried Pride of Cows’ milk at a food exhibition and was struck by the “huge difference in taste.” “We realized at some point that many of our customers were already their customers,” he said.

The appetite for upscale food products in India’s metropolitan areas is also reflected in the proliferation of grocery stores like Nature’s Basket and Modern Bazaar, whose shelves are filled with imported brands. Ashmeet Kapoor, founder and chief executive of I Say Organic, an organic foods subscription service in Delhi, said that his company had grown in particular among “those that have moved back” to India from abroad.

“It’s mostly those who’ve just started a family and want to make sure that they are eating the healthiest possible food,” Mr. Kapoor said. “These are well-placed professionals who may be influenced by the organic food movement abroad.”

The push into such premium products comes even as the broader economy shows signs of weakness. Chakradhar Gade, a graduate of the Indian Institute of Management who quit his job as a financial analyst, sees the dairy business as recession-proof.

About a year and a half ago, Mr. Gade and a business partner subcontracted a farm just outside Delhi, with around 50 cows, to form Country Fresh Milk. He went door to door in Delhi’s sprawling technology suburb of Gurgaon, and found a receptive consumer base of young professionals, new families and recent arrivals from rural communities who missed the taste of farm-fresh milk and were skeptical of regular milk’s purity.