BENGALURU: Known as Kurubas, Dhangars, Gollars in North Karnataka-Maharashtra-Telangana, the sheep and goat pastoralists dot the natural landscape of the Deccan.
They are constantly on the move – caravan style – from farmland to farmland, braving the elements. How do they meet their nutritional needs? A search for answers takes us on their trail.
It is early morning and we are out on the road at pre-dawn looking for an approachable hind (a group of few shepherds). We locate one in the horizon – a full-fledged caravan that has pitched half a dozen plastic tents in a large open field.
I go to the oldest-looking man and tell him why we are here, which is to learn about their dietary habits. He asks three-year-old Beeru to lead us to his mother, who is busy preparing the day’s meal.
Udhavva, in her early thirties and a mother of four, has began with the rising sun. The spread for the day fermented gruel broth served plain or with sheep or goat buttermilk/milk (ambli), rice, vegetable, spicy lentil curry (amti/ saaruamti/ saaru), a blend of coarsely ground garlic, green chilli, tomato, and maize roti (gonzaal rotti).
Today’s spread is elaborate as it is the day to move the caravan (ganthu yethodhu) to another farm 12 km away. The food has to suffice for three meals due to the uncertainty of being able to reach the destination before sundown.
The herdsman is always conscious of stocking up the mobile pantry with nuchuu (coarsely milled millet, jowar or maize), rava (semolina), salt, spice mix, tamarind. In greens there is generally garlic, chilli and tomato.
The shepherd gets some food from the farmer on whose farm he pens the flock – either rice, jowar, maize or minor millets. Tea powder, jaggery or sugar also form part of the package, so do seasonal vegetables and tubers (mostly sweet potato, cabbage) from the farm. There is always milk. Butter is generally served to the children fresh with the rotti. Only the occasional surplus is made into ghee. Sheep and goat milk is part of the shepherd’s diet in little or abundant quantities through the year.
According to Nilkant mama, a shepherd leader, the sheep and goats of southern Maharashtra feed on an average of 25 varieties of grass, shrub and tree foliage.
Festival menu is holige/puran poli (a sweet chapatti stuffed with cooked Bengal gram dal and jaggery, fried in ghee; eaten with hot milk), potato bhaji, amti (specially made from the water used to cook the gram), koshimbir (a green salad made with tomato, onion, soaked green gram dal, green chilli, green coriander) and rice. The sweet would be kheer or sheera.
Lamb or mutton is only taken occasionally as prasad from religious sacrificial practice once a year. Haal ambra is a speciality of the kuruba community. It is spiced milk curry that goes as a general accompaniment for rice, nucchu (gruel), ambli or rotti. On lean or busy days, it is just rice or nucchu that makes up the day’s meal with a little milk.
According to Gopi Krishna of Mitan, ‘The prime objective of the shepherd is to provide the flock with adequate forage and water, and the same thumb rule he applies to his own body needs. It is the ready availability of premium quality milk with medicinal properties that is the secret to his health.’
Shivaji Kaganikar, a shepherd by birth who spent his life serving the shepherd community, believes that is not just their dietary habit but living in complete attunement to nature’s cycle, a responsive relationship with the elements and a life of community that holds the key to their wellness and This article has been written under the aegis of CSE Media