Last year, the story of an Ahmedabad businessman holding a lavish wedding ceremony for his pet cow with a bull had left the entire country amused.
Vijaybhai, trustee of one Parsana Charitable Trust, ‘married’ his “daughter” Poonam, the cow, to Arjun, a bull from Kotiya district’s neighboring town of Badagana.
Watch a video of the wedding here:
Besides being a one-of-its-kind event, the wedding turned out to be spectacular – more than 300 guests in attendance, the “bride” travelling in a palanquin, a three-member wedding orchestra and all. The unusual event attracted wide media coverage.
And now a year later, you can be assured that the “couple” is doing fine and even has a calf.
It might sound amusing, but a Gujarati news channel called ‘Sandesh News’ decided to do a follow-up of the story and invited Vijaybhai, the owner of Poonam the cow, to the studio. Vijaybhai turned up, with the two-month-old calf of Poonam and Arjun in tow.
As Vijaybhai spoke about his love for cows and how dear his “daughter Poonam” is to him, the calf busied itself with exploring the studio and eating leaves. Adorned with silver anklets and a green scarf around its neck, the calf was also fed some food by the channel’s staff.
(Just in case it reminds you of the famous Pakistani news report of Geo TV‘s Amin Hafeez interviewing buffaloes, no the Sandesh News anchor did nothing of this sort. He just left the animal hand around and have a good time.)
You can watch the entire episode in Gujarati here:
The news show created a buzz on social media. Considering the discourse around cow these days, social media users called it “a sign of times” with many mocking the idea of having a cow in the studio.
Unbelievable : a local regional channel actually got a cow into their studio
— pallavi ghosh (@_pallavighosh) June 1, 2017
Cow in news studio. Next she will be sent to IITs, IIMs, ISRO etc to study and research. 😲😲 pic.twitter.com/q8lCKomTh6
— A. (@Adilogics) June 1, 2017
Sign of times. https://t.co/bDUYrdEyvf
— Pallavi Jha (@pallavijha) June 1, 2017
This is what Indian media has become now, Cow in d studio! @sanjayuvacha pic.twitter.com/kvlRY8O606
— Dhiraj (@AAPlogical) June 1, 2017
But well, some users pointed out that a calf, bigger in size it may be, is after all a pet like a dog and a cat and there’s nothing to be mocked here:
What a bigoted statement. Dogs and other animals are featured all the time in American TV shows. Indians like cows. It’s the same thing.
— Hindu Americans (@HinduAmericans) June 1, 2017
If American TV station has dogs in studio, you would praise it as being cool. But if cows are brought in by Indians, then you mock.
— Hindu Americans (@HinduAmericans) June 1, 2017
.