Shortly after noon on 14 March, in a makeshift tent next to a temple on Delhi’s Mandir Marg, a bizarre religious ritual was underway. A man in Hindu religious garb faced a flex banner that carried the image of a demon with the word “Corona” stamped across its chest, as well as photos, taken from tourism websites, of Chinese people eating bees, an octopus, a frog and a lobster, with speech bubbles saying, “Save us Corona!” As he sprinkled generous quantities of gaumutra—cow urine—on the image of the demon, the man chanted, “Corona shant ho jao, shant ho jao corona”—Calm down, corona. One of the assembled priests started distributing earthen cups of gaumutra as prasad, while another showered gulal mixed with gaumutra as “a blessing from god.”
Two days before, the World Health Organisation had formally declared the outbreak of the coronavirus COVID-19 a pandemic. The WHO provided all countries a four-pronged strategy: preparing health facilities, detecting and treating new cases, reducing transmission of the virus and innovating ways to tackle the pandemic. This “gaumutra party,” organised by a group known as the Akhil Bharat Hindu Mahasabha—its members claim that it is a faction of the Hindu Mahasabha of VD Savarkar—was unusual, but not particularly innovative. Over the last few years, gaumutra has been heralded as a panacea for so many diseases that it was inevitable that someone would include COVID-19 in that list.
Gaumutra is advertised as curing cancer and suppressing its symptoms, managing diabetes and insulin resistance, improving liver function, regulating thyroid hormones and iodine levels, flushing out toxins and preventing microbial infections. Several scientific papers attesting to its wonders have been published, though rarely in peer-reviewed journals, and numerous patents have been issued for gaumutra products. Following extensive patronage under the Narendra Modi government—with union ministers acting as cheerleaders for gaumutra and state-run research institutes being mobilised to bestow their claims scientific legitimacy—the gaumutra industry has flourished. In 2017, the CEO of Patanjali Ayurved, Balakrishna, estimated that the company produces five thousand litres of gaumutra every day. It is exported in large quantities and sold over all leading e-commerce platforms.
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