Military Farms closed after 132 yrs of service

Tribune News Service

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New Delhi, March 31

The Army on Wednesday closed Military Farms, a 132-year-old organisation that had become redundant with changing times. Over 20,000 acres of prime defence land can now be used for upcoming ground-based missile storage, aviation, new raisings and even housing for troops.

All its officers and workers have been redeployed within the Ministry of Defence. The future use of 20,000 acres has not been decided yet, sources said, maintaining the move to hand over the land to the Director General Defence Estates has not been okayed yet. As of now, the land is under the control of the Army.

In February 1889, the British had set up first such farm to produce quality milk and 130 farms were opened later. Earlier, cantonments were largely isolated from towns and cities. But with rapid urban growth, most cantonments are now located within population clusters. The White Revolution of the 1970s changed everything. Milk availability is a non-issue now. For almost 20 years, India has been the largest producer of milk in the world.

The original decision to close the Military Farms was taken in 2013 after a meeting of Army Commanders and the process had been on since.

Military Farms are spread across Ambala, Jalandhar, Pathankot, Jammu, Srinagar, Kargil, Udhampur, Meerut, Ranikhet, Ahmednagar, Gwalior, Jabalpur, Secunderabad, Mhow, Jhansi, Dimapur, Guwahati, Jorhat, Panagarh, Kolkata, Agra, Prayagraj, Lucknow and Kanpur among others.

These farms supplied 3.5 crore litre of milk annually. Also, in collaboration with the Agriculture Ministry, they started “Project Frieswal”, which is credited to be the world’s largest cattle cross-breeding programme.