Milkman Kurien bids adieu to SAG

VADODARA: Milkman Verghese Kurien has put down his papers in another dairy sector organisation due to continuing differences with his former protégé Amrita Patel. This time, the dispute is over fixing the price of frozen semen.

Kurien has sent his resignation to the Sabarmati Ashram Gaushala (SAG) Trust. It maybe taken up for consideration at the organisation’s next board meeting. SAG is engaged in semen production and embryo transfer with a herd of about 170 bulls. SAG managing committee is headed by Dipak Tikku, managing director of the National Dairy Development Board (NDDB).

Patel chairs NDDB and IndiaGen apart from being an invitee board member of Gujarat Co-operative Milk Marketing Federation since Kurien stepped down from the board of the marketer of the Amul brand. Kurien decided to withdraw his services from SAG as its managing committee handed over the power to fix the prices of frozen semen for domestic and international market to IndiaGen, a joint venture of US based Co-operative Resources International and NDDB’s subsidiary Indian Immunological Ltd (IIL).

The JV was formed in early January, 2005 to provide breeding and advisory services to farmers. The SAG board is scheduled to meet on September 4, 2006 in NDDB where Kurien’s resignation is likely to be accepted. “I have resigned from SAG with immediate effect and there is possibility of reconsideration on my side,” Kurien told ET.

Sources close to the development told ET that Kurien would have resigned from SAG anyway, but he found a strong reason to put in his papers sooner as he has been an advocate of self-dependency without the help from foreign hands. Interestingly, Kurien was offered the chairmanship of SAG since NDDB took over its management in 1973.

But Kurien proposed that a true Gandhian only should head SAG, while he is an atheist and non-vegetarian. SAG is one of the premiere institutions in the country practicing animal husbandry and facilitating dairying in the country. since inception. The center has breeding and R&D activities at Bidaj located in Kaira district of Gujarat. Mahatma Gandhi founded SAG in 1915.