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Amul

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This article is about the cooperative. For other uses, see Amul (disambiguation).

Anand Milk Union Limited
Amul Coop
Native name
The Kaira District Co-Opp Milk Producers Union Ltd.
Company typeCooperative
IndustryDairy
Founded14 December 1946; 78 years ago (1946-12-14)
FounderTribhuvandas Patel
HeadquartersAnand, Gujarat, India
Area served
Worldwide
Key people
Jayen Mehta (managing director)
ProductsMilk products
RevenueIncrease ₹80,000 crore (US$9.6 billion)[1] (2024)
Number of employees
1,000 (officers and employees)
3.6 million (milk producers)[2]
Divisions
Websiteamul.com

Anand Milk Union Limited commonly known as Amul is an Indian dairy brand owned by the cooperative society, Gujarat Cooperative Milk Marketing Federation (GCMMF), based in Anand, Gujarat.[3][4] GCMMF is controlled by 3.6 million milk producers.[5]

Tribhuvandas Kishibhai Patel founded the organisation in 1946 and served as its chairman until his retirement in the 1970s. He hired Verghese Kurien in 1949,[6][7] initially as the general manager, where Kurien guided the technical and marketing efforts of the cooperative. Kurien briefly became the chairman of Amul following Patel's death in 1994, and is credited with the success of Amul's marketing.[8]

Amul spurred India's White Revolution, which made the country the world's largest producer of milk and milk products,[9] and has since ventured into overseas markets.[10]

History

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Verghese Kurien, Tribhuvandas Kishibhai Patel, and Harichand Megha Dalaya

Amul was founded on 19 December 1946 as a response to the exploitation of small dairy farmers by traders and agents. At the time, milk prices were arbitrarily determined, giving Polson an effective monopoly in milk collection from Kaira and its subsequent supply to Mumbai.[11][12]

Frustrated with the trade practices (which they perceived as unfair), the farmers of Kaira, led by Tribhuvandas Patel, approached Vallabhbhai Patel, who advised them to form a cooperative. If they did so, they would be able to directly supply their milk to the Bombay Milk Scheme instead of working for Polson.[13] Sardar Patel sent Morarji Desai to organise the farmers.[12]

Following a meeting in Chaklasi, the farmers formed the cooperative and resolved not to provide Polson with any more milk.[13] Milk collection was decentralised, as most producers were marginal farmers who could deliver, at most, 1–2 litres of milk per day. Cooperatives were formed for each village.[14] By June 1948, the KDCMPUL had started pasteurising milk for the Bombay Milk Scheme. Then-Prime Minister Lal Bahadur Shastri visited Anand to inaugurate Amul's cattle feed factory. On 31 October 1964, he spoke to farmers about their cooperative. After returning to Delhi, he set in motion the creation of an organisation, the National Dairy Development Board (NDDB), to replicate the Kaira cooperative in other parts of India. Under the leadership of Tribhuvandas Patel, in 1973, Amul celebrated its 25th anniversary with Morarji Desai, Maniben Patel, and Verghese Kurien.[15]

The cooperative was further developed through the efforts of Verghese Kurien and H. M. Dalaya. Dalaya's innovation of making skim milk powder from buffalo milk was a technological breakthrough that revolutionised India's organised dairy industry.[16]

With Kurien's help, the process was expanded on a commercial scale, which led to the first modern dairy cooperative at Anand. This cooperative would go on to compete against the established players in the market.[17]

The success of the trio (T. K. Patel, Kurien, and Dalaya) at the cooperative's dairy soon spread to Anand's neighbourhood in Gujarat. Within a short span, five unions in other districts—Mehsana, Banaskantha, Baroda, Sabarkantha, and Surat – were set up, following the approach sometimes described as the Anand pattern.[12]

In 1970, the cooperative spearheaded the "White Revolution" of India. To combine forces and expand the market while saving on advertising and avoiding competing against each other, the Gujarat Co-operative Milk Marketing Federation Ltd., an apex marketing body of these district cooperatives, was set up in 1973. The Kaira Union, which had the brand name Amul with it since 1955, transferred it to GCMMF. Technological developments at Amul have subsequently spread to other parts of India.[18]

In 1999, it was awarded the "Best of All" Rajiv Gandhi National Quality Award.[19]

Promotion and advertisement

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See also: Amul girl

In 1966, Amul hired Sylvester daCunha, the managing director of an advertising agency, to design an ad campaign for Amul Butter. DaCunha created an operation consisting of a series of hoardings featuring topical ads related to day-to-day issues.[20] It was popular and earned a Guinness World Record for the longest-running ad campaign in the world. In the 1980s, cartoon artist Kumar Morey and scriptwriter Bharat Dabholkar were involved in sketching the Amul ads; the latter rejected the trend of using celebrities in advertisement campaigns. Dabholkar credited chairman Verghese Kurien with creating a free atmosphere that fostered the development of the ads.[21]

Despite encountering political pressure on several occasions, daCunha's agency has made it a policy not to back down. Some of the more controversial Amul ads include one commenting on the Naxalite uprising in West Bengal, one on the Indian Airlines employees' strike, and one depicting the Amul girl wearing a Gandhi cap.

In 2013, Amul tweeted a picture featuring the Amul Butter Girl, implying that "freedom of choice" died in 2013, in opposition to the Supreme Court of India overruling the judgment of the High Court of Delhi and criminalising homosexuality again.[22]

On 17 October 2016, the Amul Butter Girl celebrated 50 years since she first appeared in the topical ad, titled "Thoroughbred". The ad showed a jockey holding a slice of bread during the horse race season in 1966. The impish Amul girl had appeared for the first time even before that, with Eustace Fernandez showing her offering bedtime prayers with a wink and a lick of lips, saying "Give us this day our daily bread: with Amul butter".[23]

Their ad on Aagey Badhta Hai India had an excellent response from the audience. It spoke about how their milk is seen as a household product, with a catchy tune associated with it. It has over 39 lakh (3.9 million) views on YouTube.[24]

In February 2020, Amul posted a picture of the Amul girl treating Joaquin Phoenix with butter after his academy award win for his role in the 2019 film, Joker.[25] Since Phoenix is a vegan, Amul faced criticism from vegans in India and PETA for the poor knowledge of his vegan activism and life.

In July 2024, Amul featured Maya Neelakantan, a ten-year-old guitar prodigy who auditioned for America's Got Talent season 19 in June 2024.[26]

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The White Revolution inspired filmmaker Shyam Benegal to base his 1976 film Manthan on it. The film was financed by over five lakh (half a million) rural farmers in Gujarat, who contributed ₹2 each to its budget. Upon its release, these farmers went in truckloads to watch 'their' film, making it a commercial success.[27][28] Manthan won the National Film Award for Best Hindi Feature Film during the 24th National Film Awards in 1977.

See also

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References

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  1. ^ "Amul group plans Europe entry". Retrieved 7 October 2024.
  2. ^ "Gujarat Co-operative Milk Marketing Federation (AMUL) achieves a turnover of Rs. 52000 crore 7billion crores with 17% growth" (PDF). Amul. Archived (PDF) from the original on 18 September 2020. Retrieved 1 April 2020.
  3. ^ Laidlaw, Alexander Fraser (1977). Cooperatives and the Poor: A View from Within the Cooperative Movement : a Development Study Prepared for the International Cooperative Alliance and the Canadian International Development Agency. Archived from the original on 4 April 2023. Retrieved 11 March 2023.
  4. ^ Singh, Govind; Rosencranz, Armin (20 October 2021). "Cows and their milk". The Statesman. Archived from the original on 3 January 2023. Retrieved 3 June 2022.
  5. ^ Gupta, Reeta. "General Management Review". www.etgmr.com. Archived from the original on 2 March 2004. Retrieved 9 March 2023.
  6. ^ Heredia, Ruth (1997). The Amul India Story. New Delhi: Tata Mc-Graw Hill. p. 65. ISBN 978-0-07-463160-7. Archived from the original on 9 March 2023. Retrieved 1 July 2020.
  7. ^ Misra, Udit (10 September 2012). "V. Kurien: India's White Knight". Forbes India. Archived from the original on 2 April 2019. Retrieved 11 September 2012.
  8. ^ Dasgupta, Manas (9 September 2012). "Kurien strode like a titan across the bureaucratic barriers and obstacles". The Hindu. Chennai, India. Archived from the original on 12 September 2012. Retrieved 13 September 2012.
  9. ^ "Dairy Articles". IndiaDairy. Archived from the original on 9 March 2023. Retrieved 9 March 2023.
  10. ^ Srinivas, Nidhi Nath. "Amul's world's biggest vegetarian cheese brand exports cheese to the US, Middle East, Singapore, Hong Kong with sales estimated to touch 600 tonne in 2005". The Economic Times. Archived from the original on 5 October 2017. Retrieved 1 July 2020.
  11. ^ George, Shanti (1985). Operation Flood: An Appraisal of Current Indian Dairy Policy. Oxford University Press. ISBN 978-0-19-561679-8. Archived from the original on 4 April 2023. Retrieved 9 March 2023.
  12. ^ a b c Heredia, Ruth (1997). The Amul India story. New Delhi: Tata McGraw-Hill. ISBN 9780074631607.
  13. ^ a b Suhrud, Tridip (8 April 2006). "The magic of manthan". Tehelka. Archived from the original on 11 November 2006. Retrieved 2 February 2011.
  14. ^ Thapar, Romila (2001). "Seminar, Issues 497–508". Seminar.
  15. ^ Gupta, Sharad. "Remembering Verghese Kurien – India's first milkman". businessline. Archived from the original on 21 October 2021. Retrieved 10 March 2021.
  16. ^ Kurien, Verghese (2007). "India' s Milk Revolution: Investing in Rural Producer Organizations". In Narayan, Deepa; Glinskaya, Elena (eds.). Ending Poverty in South Asia: Ideas that work. Washington D.C., USA: The World Bank. p. 47. ISBN 978-0-8213-6876-3. Archived from the original on 9 March 2023. Retrieved 13 January 2021. If there was one technological breakthrough that revolutionized India's organized dairy industry, it was the making of skim milk powder out of buffalo milk. The man who made this possible and who had the foresight to defy the prevailing technical wisdom was H. M. Dalaya.
  17. ^ "Economic and political weekly, Volume 6, Part 4". Economic and Political Weekly. 6. 1971.
  18. ^ The Cheese Industry in India. Chillibreeze.
  19. ^ Shrawan (29 May 2013). "Annex iv: list of award winners of Rajiv Gandhi national quality awards" (PDF). bis.org.in. New Delhi: Bureau of Indian Standards. Archived (PDF) from the original on 2 December 2014. Retrieved 15 May 2014.
  20. ^ Varma, Mini. "The moppet who put Amul on India's breakfast table". Amul. Archived from the original on 13 June 2011. Retrieved 2 February 2011.
  21. ^ Rao, Subha J. (15 December 2007). "Punch guru". The Hindu. Chennai, India. Archived from the original on 8 November 2012. Retrieved 2 February 2011.
  22. ^ "Brands peek out of the closet – The Times of India". The Times of India. Archived from the original on 13 December 2013. Retrieved 28 March 2014.
  23. ^ "In pics Fifty years on, Amul's 'utterly butterly' girl is still a delight". Hindustan Times. 16 October 2016. Archived from the original on 23 January 2023. Retrieved 23 January 2023.
  24. ^ Archived at Ghostarchive and the Wayback Machine: Amul The Taste of India (10 July 2015), Amul Milk – Aage Badta Hai India, retrieved 9 April 2019
  25. ^ "Amul smears butter on vegan Joaquin Phoenix's face in an ad celebrating Oscar win, gets slammed by PETA". Hindustan Times. Indo Asian News Service. 12 February 2020. Archived from the original on 12 February 2020. Retrieved 3 May 2021.
  26. ^ Baruah, Akashdeep (8 July 2024). "Amul pays tribute to 'Rock Goddess' Maya Neelakantan - CNBC TV18". CNBCTV18. Retrieved 23 July 2024.
  27. ^ "Phalke award for Benegal". NDTV. 8 August 2007. Archived from the original on 19 July 2011. Retrieved 9 March 2023.
  28. ^ "Manas: Culture, Indian Cinema- Shyam Benegal". www.sscnet.ucla.edu. Archived from the original on 5 August 2012. Retrieved 9 March 2023.
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