Mainstream Weekly  About Mainstream  Archives (2006 on)  2015 Home > 2015 > Beef, Buffalo and Brahmanism: The Politics of Food Mainstream, VOL LIII, No 18, April 25, 2015 BEEF, BUFFALO AND BRAHMANISM: THE POLITICS OF FOOD Saturday 25 April 2015 by Navneet Sharma, Pradeep Nair and Harikrishnan B. Cow is a national animal. Cow is our mother. Cow is a useful domestic animal. Cow has four legs, two eyes, one mouth and one tail. Cow gives us milk.... cow has a calf that grows into Sanjay Gandhi. Excerpts from the essay written on The Cow by a class 5 student in 1976. Source: Verbal testimony of a teacher educator The ‘image’ and imageries are very important in electoral democratic politics. The above essay reflects how Mrs Gandhi (Indira Gandhi) and her younger son, crown prince Sanjay Gandhi, were perceived through the cow-calf symbol of the Congress Party in the 1970s, following the imposition of Emergency. The imageries are important to democracy, more so to win elections. Even Nehru with his progressive stance to science and scientific temper still mollycoddled the Hindu vote-bank and farmers, though softly, through the symbol of the field ploughing oxen. The idea of ‘secular’ India is evolving still from the aftermath of the partition of India, whereby the debunked two-religion theory, as advocated, somehow made appeasement to one or another religion. India is seen as the rightful place for revived Hinduism or political-Hinduism which originated only as a response to Muslim and British coming to India. This political-Hinduism alone became a voice for revivalism opposing sati, devdasis, casteism and flesh eating—in particular to eating cow’s flesh. This political-Hinduism grew with the help of the Arya Samaj, Prarthana Samaj, Ram Krishna Mission and many others of similar ilk. They supported vegetarianism, non-violence and freedom of the being, thus opposing moral challenges and dilemmas posed by Islamic and Christian traditions to ‘Sanatan’ dharma. This also led to the