![]() Looking back at the Polson brand, it also had a girl mascot although she was a serious mascot in the style of all the old early 20 th century brands, not entertaining like the Amul girl. Incidentally Polson’s dairy was also set up in Anand. Until Amul came onto the scene the butter market was dominated by Polson, a dairy brand which was started in India by Pestonjee Eduljee in 1915 in Mumbai. Kurien established the GCMMF (Gujarat Cooperative Milk Manufacturers Federation) to sell milk products of different dairies under a common name Amul (Anand Milk Union Limited ). Making other milk products like skimmed milk powder, cheese, etc was a dire necessity to prevent the excess supply of milk in winter from getting wasted. Later, making cheese from buffalo milk was also considered a first.ĭr Kurien had realised that the buffalo lactates more in winter, producing an oversupply of milk during the winter months. And skimmed milk powder had never been made from buffalo milk so when Dr Kurien supervised this process, India became the first country to do so because technology was available only for making skimmed milk powder from cow’s milk. He also made a great success of the cooperative movement which until then was riddled with politics and vested interests.īut the great innovation for Amul was that India, unlike other countries, had mainly buffalo milk rather than cow milk. India went from a milk deficient nation to a milk surplus one thanks to Dr Kurien, and achieved the remarkable feat of making India the largest milk producer in the world. For a young advertising trainee a few months old, it was overwhelming to meet a man of Dr Kurien’s towering stature.ĭr Verghese Kurien, better known as the Father of the White Revolution, brought dignity and fame to the concept of social entrepreneurship when it was not yet fashionable to be a social entrepreneur. ![]() I was overcome by the awe of meeting with Dr Kurien. From the Baroda airport we were to take a taxi to Anand. This was my first job in advertising and somehow Sylvester had already instilled a fear into me, common with young trainees in their first job. I was taking a trip with Sylvester da Cunha (one of India’s original mad men in the world of advertising), Managing Director of Da Cunha Associates, the ad agency for Amul, and not looking forward to the early-morning flight to Baroda which meant I would need to reach the airport at 4.30 am. ![]() I was anxious during my trip to Anand in the winter of 1977. I can still hum the first radio jingle first created for Amul butter, now long forgotten by everyone. “Amul is the answer to your wishes, utterly butterly delicious”. The Amul mascot has gone beyond butter to become an indelible part of Indian life, writes Prabhakar Mundkur She’s a little girl of 54, and she will never age.
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