JAIPUR: Would you wash your living room floors or your kitchen with animal excreta? Well, in ‘Post-modern’ India, a health minister, no less, has ordered that government hospital wards be ‘disinfected’ with cow urine!

Rajasthan health minister Rajendra Rathore has ordered that Cow urine replace phenyl as a disinfectant in Jaipur’s Sawai Man Singh (SMS) hospital, one of the biggest government-run hospitals in northern India.

It’s part of a pilot project by the Rajasthan government to test the ‘effectiveness’ of cow urine as a disinfectant.

Following the minister’s orders, the SMS hospital administration (daresay against their better judgement) is all set to test the effectiveness of ‘Gau Clean’, locally manufatctured ‘disinfectant’ manufactured by a trust that runs a ‘gau mutra’ (cow urine) refinery at Pathmeda in Sirohi district.

Instead of testing the qualities of this so-called disinfectant in a scientific lab, the minister plans to put hundreds of patients at risk. No sceinetists, but a ‘three person committee of government doctors’ will pass judgement on the effectiveness of the cow urine.

SMS hospital superintendent Dr Man Prakash Sharma said in the wards where ‘Gau Clean’ will be tested for 15 days, no other disinfectant will be used. “We have constituted a committee of three doctors which will test the effectiveness of the ‘gau mutra’ disinfectant.” The committee will analyse its use in the ICU, on various medical equipment, hospital floor and various other properties as a disinfectant and a report will be submitted to the government.

The hospital is in the process of identifying the areas where the new product will be tested. The administration has already received 50 bottles of ‘Gau Clean’ for the pilot project.

Rajasthan based human rights activist Kavitha Swaminathan objects, “ Do we know the consequences of using cow urine as disinfectant? First tell us where the urine is coming from. Are they from the gaushalas (cow shelters)which have large numbers of TB infected cows or from elsewhere? Otherwise we will be parcelling to each patient return gift of the order of bovine TB. Health minister, Mr Rathore, why try the experiment in SMS, the largest public hospital? Why not run the pilot in some of the private hospitals that your Government is favouring by handing over to them 300 PHCs and CHCs?” she asks.

Confirming the state government’s move, Rajasthan’s minister of Gaupalan (cow-rearing) department Otaram Dewasi told local media, “Our primary aim is to find out how cow can become a source of income. If we want people to keep cow, then it should also earn some revenue. At Pathmeda gaushala, the researchers are trying to make products from cow urine so that it could become a source of income.”

He said once the ‘effectiveness’ of the disinfectant manufactured in Pathmeda is tested at the SMS hospital, the government will take the next step. “Once ‘Gau Clean’ gets the licence from the Ayurveda department, it can be used in other government offices, buildings and even people will buy it from the market,” Dewasi added.

  health, India, naked truth, NARENDRA MODI, Rajasthan, stupid moves