Animal husbandry

Preserving India's Domesticated Animals

Domestication of animals occurred in India between 6000 and 4500 BC. The people of the Indus Valley had already domesticated zebus (humped cattle), buffaloes, elephants, camels, goats, fowl, etc. The most prominent animal is no doubt the humped bull that appears on the seals of Mohenjo-Daro. With its enormous dewlap and its well-developed hump, it resembles the kankrej which is probably a survivor of that ancient zebu breed from the Indus Valley.

Livestock keeping is a millennia-old tradition of ancient India. The cow being a sacred animal, it is believed that maintaining cattle would have been the responsibility of religious priests. They would have been the first animal healers or veterinarians. A number of Vedic hymns indicate medicinal values of the herbs and it is likely that priests would have used their medical knowledge to keep the sacred cattle healthy and disease free. Gau Ayurveda would have been the first veterinary science. Voluminous treatises have been written on cows, a unique gift of India to the whole world.

Veterinary science flourished in the Vedic period. Ancient Indian scriptures, the Vedas, Puranas, Brahmanas, Atharvaveda… are flooded with information about ailments of animals, herbal medicines, and cure of diseases. Shalihotra (2352BC), the first known veterinarian of the world, was an expert in horse care and wrote the Haya Ayurveda. It is a huge manuscript having more than 12,000 Sanskrit shlokas on the care and management of horses. Sage Palakapya, the ultimate authority on elephants, composed the Hasti-Ayurveda, a treatise on elephant science.

A large portion of India's livestock has been developed by pastoralist communities - Rabaris, Maldharis, Dhangars, Gaddi to name just a few. Each livestock breed is associated with a particular community that possesses specific time-tested traditional ecological knowledge regarding animal husbandry. This indigenous knowledge deals with breeding methods and ethnoveterinary practices. Unfortunately, this local knowledge has been so far very less documented.

Today, India has inherited about 150 native breeds of domesticated animals: 30 breeds of cattle, 10 breeds of buffalo, 42 breeds of sheep, 6 breeds of horse, 9 breeds of camel, 18 breeds of poultry and also yaks, donkeys… These breeds have evolved within their own unique environment for centuries and are therefore best suited to Indian conditions.

With pastoralist communities in crisis, indigenous livestock breeds are threatened of extinction. Breeds will survive as long as pastoralist communities with their indigenous knowledge pertaining to animal husbandry also survive.

Many breeds of domesticated animals are also becoming rare because they are not considered as profitable as the modern, so-called superior breeds which produce more meat, more milk, more wool, or more eggs. Regional breeds should be preserved for qualities such as adaptability to extreme climatic conditions, resistance to disease, fertility...