Looking back at all the decisions of the Modi Government it comes as no surprise that Gau-pyaar has become official phenomenon. But now that it’s become a driving force behind national economic allocation it may be time to stop laughing and start paying attention. Since the beef ban was first implemented, it has been the subject of unending debate on the basis of religion, animal rights, environmentally conscious policy making and everything a government can come up with to make sure their propaganda is protected. Now this ‘nationalist’ campaign has taken on a new development: Aadhaar identifications for cows.

Asian News International (ANI) tweeted out the Supreme Court’s decision on providing Unique Identification for cattle, an idea that was part of a larger report on the protection of cows and preventing the illegal smuggling of cattle across the India-Bangladesh border. The discussion also included the implementation of special care facilities for cattle beyond the age of milking. Whether or not the decisions on giving cows Aadhaar numbers and better treatment of cattle are strongly related, hasn’t been explicitly mentioned, but is the latter probably going to be used another rationale to justify the beef ban? Probably, yes.

The beef ban has never been welcomed with open arms, but this next possible headway simply makes no fiscal sense. The proposed system would include a new centralised database, where all 88 million (and growing) numbers of bovine across the nation would be provided with a unique tag consisting of a 12 numeric digit ID inside their ear. Data collected and stored would contain details of the cattle’s sex, breed, age, height, body colour, horn type, any other body marks and even tail switch, and milch cattle would include an additional lactation profile. The Aadhaar card itself would state the breed, age, owner details, location and vaccination history, according to a report by First Post. The icing on cake is actually the funding allocated to run this project: a whopping total of Rs. 148 crore.

This move, though outwardly frivolous and amusing actually masks a much more insidious truth. That the cow-centric minds of the Modi Government are willing to drop crores on a cow ID’s while ignoring the pitiful state of the country’s wildlife conservation. The constant population growth and subsequent reclamation of forest land has resulted in extensive habitat loss while unchecked poaching is pushing already endangered species to the brink of extinction. Animals, birds, marine life every sphere of the Indian fauna is suffering and yet the government feels that cattle should take precedence?

The entire wildlife budget for 2017 is 522.50 crores which seems like a lot until you realise that an equivalent quarter of this amount will be used to track and label cows alone. Perhaps that 148 crore they are so flippantly dedicating to what are essentially bovine name tags could instead restore the forests of the Bengal Tiger, clean the watery homes of the Gharial or the South Asian River Dolphin, protect the Great Indian Bustard from poachers, save the Red Panda, the Snow Leopard, the Indian Rhinos, Black Bucks, Dugong’s, Vultures, Sea Turtles, the list just goes on and on. Better yet, if tracking is the ultimate goal, they could instead track animals that are very near extinct to better understand how they can protect these creatures from complete extinction.

For a country that prides itself on diversity - in its wildlife as much as in its population - the decision to take on a project circling one Indian species that flourishes pretty well on its own is baffling. When so many of the country’s indigenous wildlife is slipping away and the health of the environment itself is so poor the knowledge that government funds are being handled so casually doesn’t give us much hope. So next time, instead of mourning the extinction of another ancient species, ruminate on the fact that the money that could have saved them was deemed better spent on a cow’s tattoo.

Feature image courtesy Indiatimes.