How Iron Man launched India on its milky way

Meeting In A Gujarat Village Laid Foundation Of Cooperative Dairy Movement That Has Made India World’s Biggest Milk Producer

- Prashant Rupera

India is the biggest milk producer in the world today but 75 years ago it made a small start on the ‘milky way’ when Kaira District

Cooperative Milk Producers’ Union Limited (KDCMPUL) collected 250 litres of milk from two villages in modern-day Anand.

What KDCMPUL lacked in scale, it made up for with zeal. After all, it was not just another business but a call to end the monopoly of Polson Dairy, a private player that had flourished under the British Raj.

The ‘movement’ started in 1946 with a farmers’ meeting in Samarkha, a village in Gujarat’s Kaira district. Among the wise heads at the table were India’s ‘Iron Man’ Sardar Vallabhbhai Patel, future PM Morarji Desai, and freedom fighter Tribhuvandas Patel, now fondly remembered as Tribhuvan kaka. It was a moment for the history books.

Not cowed by the Raj

Polson Dairy had secured the rights to procure milk from the entire Kaira district. It was the first time the British had waded into India’s milk sector. Farmers were angry because Polson exploited them, and they resolved to form a cooperative. Inspired by Patel’s call, KDCMPUL was registered on December 14, 1946, and found its feet under Tribhuvan kaka’s leadership.