Union Minister of Fisheries, Animal Husbandry and Dairying Parshottam Rupala to felicitate winners of Gopal Ratna Awards on National Milk Day 2021

New Delhi : The Department of Animal Husbandry and Dairying, Government of India,is organizing a mega event to commemorate the birth centenary of Dr. Varghese Kurien (Milk Man of India), which is celebrated as National Milk Day, on November 26, 2021, jointly with the National Dairy Development Board and other institutions created by Dr. Kurien, at the TK Patel Auditorium, National Dairy Development Board (NDDB) Campus, NDDB, Anand, Gujarat from 10:00 amto 2.00 pm.

During the ceremony, Union Minister for Animal Husbandry and Dairying Shri ParshottamRupala will confer the National GopalRatna Awards to winners of the Best Dairy Farmer rearing indigenous cattle/buffalo breeds, Best Artificial Insemination Technician and Best Dairy Cooperative Society (DCS)/ Milk Producer Company/ Dairy Farmer Producer Organisation in the country. The Minister will also inaugurate/launch an IVF (in vitro fertilization) Lab at Dhamrod, Gujarat and Hessergatta, Karnataka, besides felicitating the winners of the prestigious National GopalRatna Awards.

GopalRatna Award 2021:

Indigenous bovine breeds of India are robust and possess the genetic potential to play crucial role in the national economy. In the absence of a specific programme on development and conservation of indigenous breeds, their population has been declining and their performance is below the potential at present. Thus the Department of Animal Husbandry and Dairying under the Ministry of Fisheries, Animal Husbandry and Dairying, had initiated “RashtriyaGokul Mission”, under National Programme for Bovine Breeding and Dairy Development in December 2014 with a view to conserve and develop indigenous bovine breeds.

The objective of the programme is genetic up-gradation of Cattle and Buffaloes. To achieve this, Artificial Insemination (A.I.) service needs to be robust. There are 302 million bovines in the country as per 20^th Livestock census. The average productivity is 5 kg per day per animal at present. AI technicians have a crucial role in transforming the bovine population from the state of low productivity to optimal productivity. Hence, after the Farmers who rear the animals, there is a need to identify the best AI technician striving hard towards 100% AI coverage so as to achieve the country’s flagship programme objective of doubling of farmers’ income.

Similarly, 1.9 lakh Dairy cooperative societies and Milk producer Companies at village level are growth drivers as it involves about 2 cr dairy farmer as members and act as a rural institution to provide the farmers market access for their produce and help in earning remunerative price.

GopalRatna Award – one of the highest National Awardsin the field of livestock and dairy sector, with an objective to encourage all individuals and Dairy cooperative societies / Milk Producer Company / Dairy farmers Producers Organizations working in this sector, are conferred in three categories, namely,

Best Dairy Farmer Rearing Indigenous Cattle/buffalo Breeds,
Best Artificial Insemination Technician (AIT) and
Best Dairy Cooperative/ Milk Producer Company/ Dairy Farmer Producer Organization).

Award consists of a Certificate of merit, a memento and amount in each category as under:

- Rs. 5,00,000/-(Rupee five lakh only) -1^st rank
- Rs. 3,00,000/- (Rupee three lakh only) -2^nd rank and
- Rs. 2,00,000/- (Rupee two lakh only) -3^rd rank

For the first time, applications were invited on self-nomination through theonline application portal https://gopalratnaaward.qcin.org developed by the Quality Council of India(QCI) started from 15.07.2021 to 15.09.2021. The last date of submission was extended to 15.10.2021. In total, 4,401 applications were received online as under.

S. No.	Category	Total No. of applications received in portal
1.	Best Dairy farmer rearing indigenous cattle/buffalo breeds;	1,628
2.	Best Artificial Insemination Technician (AlT); and	1,240
3.	Best Dairy Cooperative / Milk Producer Company / Dairy Farmer Producer Organization).	1,533
Total		4,401

All the applications shown in above table were received online by the application portal developed by Quality Council of lndia. The applications were evaluated as per score card provided in the guidelines of the GopalRatna Award by the QCl. The preliminary Screening was done on the basis of total score secured by the applicants as well as taking state-wise entries into considerations for equity of distribution. On preliminary assessment 23 applications in each category were shortlisted by QCl. These 23 applications in each category were provided to the National Dairy Development Board (NDDB) for carrying out field verification to ascertain factual information. Based on the outcome of field verification /field visit, the Screening Committee in its meeting dated 15.11.2021 further shortlisted total 20 applicants (6 applications in Best Dairy Farmer rearing indigenous breed category, 5 applications in Best Artificial Insemination (AIT) category and 9 applications in the Best Dairy Cooperative / Milk producer Company/Dairy Farmer Producer Organisation category) for consideration by National Award Committee.

The National Award Committee discussed all three categories in details. While discussing the Best Dairy Farmer rearing indigenous breed, the primary consideration was on rearing indigenous breeds of cattle and/or buffalo and accordingly greater weightage was given to those rearing more indigenous breeds than the exotic/cross bred ones. The Committee also gave considerable weightage to small farmers rearing indigenous cattle/buffalo. In case of selection of Best Artificial Insemination Technician, the number as well as performance of Artificial insemination were given due consideration. In case of Best Dairy Cooperative / Milk producer Company/Dairy Farmer Producer Organisation; emphasis was given on number of farmers associated, milk procured, geographical constraints etc.

After detailed discussion, the Committee selected 1^st, 2^nd and 3^rd ranks in each category as under:

S. No.