Amul versus Nandini, Karnataka’s local dairy brand, is “fake” and Congress is using it to fuel its election campaign, BJP MP Tejasvi Surya.
The politics behind Amul versus Nandini, Karnataka’s local dairy brand, is “fake” and Congress is using it to fuel its election campaign, said BJP MP Tejasvi Surya.
In an exclusive interview to News18, Surya said the opposition had to manufacture fake and non-existent issues as it was frustrated over the possibility of losing the upcoming polls on May 10.
“If you have a problem with Amul, then you should also have problems with brands like Arokya, Heritage from Tamil Nadu, Thirumala, and Dodla from Andhra Pradesh. Why only target Amul? People of Karnataka clearly know that it is not love for Nandini but their hate towards Amul as it is from Gujarat; and Amit Shah and Narendra Modi are from Gujarat,” the MP from Bengaluru South said.
He also pointed out that Amul was a brand operating and selling products for decades in Karnataka and, unlike allegations made by the opposition, it was not a conspiracy to bring Amul into Karnataka. He also asked leader of opposition Siddaramaiah to be answerable to the people of Karnataka as to what he had done to improve the growth and health of the Karnataka Milk Federation (KMF), whose products are sold under the name Nandini.
He had said: “Amul and KMF will work together towards ensuring there is a primary dairy in every village of the state. In 47 years, Karnataka has progressed in the dairy sector and the turnover has increased by Rs 4 crore to Rs 25,000 crore during the same period. Amul and KMF have to work together to boost the cooperative dairy in Karnataka.”
The issue spiralled into a full-blown controversy last week when Amul’s official Twitter handle posted a series of social media posters – ‘The #Amul family brings in some Taaza into #Bengaluru city. More updates coming in soon. #LaunchAlert.’
This was quickly picked on by social media and Karnataka politicians, who began using hashtags like #GoBackAmul and #SaveNandini in protest. Senior Congress leader Siddaramaiah tweeted appealing to Kannadigas to boycott the Amul brand and “support Karnataka Milk Federation (KMF), which is the livelihood of millions of dairy farming families in the country
WHAT IS THE CONTROVERSY?
The politics over milk has taken over headlines in the poll-bound state with ‘Amul versus Nandini’ being made an election issue, especially by Congress and JD(S). The genesis of this controversy was a statement made by Union home minister Amit Shah in December 2022 while he was inaugurating a mega-dairy unit of KMF in Mandya.
