Ahmedabad: Banas Dairy, a member of the Gujarat Co-operative Milk Marketing Federation (the owner of Amul brand) is going to establish a processing plant in Varanasi.
“Banas Dairy will establish a processing plant at the cost of Rs 200-250 crore in Varanasi, which can process five lakh litres of milk a day “ dairy chairman Parthi Bhatol told PTI.
The Uttar Pradesh government had provided 30 acres of land for the plant which will start functioning in the next few months, he said.
The milk cooperative sector in Gujarat is controlled by BJP leaders. Bhatol, a BJP member himself, praised Uttar Pradesh Chief Minister Akhilesh Yadav for his cooperation.
“We asked for land in Kanpur two-three months ago. The UP Chief Minister showed willingness to give us land wherever we wanted, so we asked for land in Varanasi and got it,” he said.
“We have already set up a plant in Lucknow with the capacity of 20 lakh litres of milk per day and in Kanpur which can process 40 lakh litres of milk per day,” Bhatol said.
R S Sodhi, Managing Director, GCMMF, said it would benefit the Uttar Pradesh farmers.
“UP is the biggest milk producer of the country, but only one per cent of milk producers there were covered by the cooperative sector. Milk producers were facing the great losses. But with the establishment of these processing plants, they will be making profit,” he told PTI.
The milk producers earlier got Rs 18 to 19 per litre; they would be earning Rs 35 per litre once the milk processing units start operating, he added.
“We will start with packaged milk, buttermilk and later we will include all the Amul products,” he said.
