Patehra (Mirzapur), Uttar Pradesh

Sunil Kumar Pal stood under a tree sheltering under its branches as it rained heavily. As he waited for the rain to subside, he utilised the time shearing hair off the back of a sheep he had with him.

Sunil Kumar Pal, of Patehra village in Mirzapur, is no more than 15 years old, and he said he was herding sheep for at least three years. His father owned 150 sheep, he told Gaon Connection. 

“We leave our sheep overnight in the fields of farmers to fertilise their land with the dung. In return, the farmers give us dal, chawal and atta [pulses, rice and flour],” Sunil Pal said. That was one of the main sources of food for them, he said. 

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The 15-year-old lad is a member of the Pal community, predominantly shepherds, in Mirzapur district of Uttar Pradesh, which falls under the OBC (other backward class). As per the 2011 census, in Marihan tehsil alone there were 8,000 people in the community, most of them shepherds.

The members of this community own sheep and sell their wool to make a living. They often survive on the rations the farmers give them in exchange for the sheep dung that acts as a fertiliser for their farms.

“We get five kilos of grain from the farmer  if we leave fifty sheep in their farm overnight. The sheep dung fertilises their fields. That is how we survive,” Phulel Pal from Patehra village, told Gaon Connection. Phulel explained that 100 sheep can yield about 30-40 kgs of wool.  

Each sheep yields between 200 grams (gms) and 300 gms of wool that the Pal shepherds sell to agents who buy it at Rs 8 a kilo. “In a day each one of us shears the wool from about 25 sheep. It takes about four months for the wool to grow back,” Sunil said. 

Thus, it takes four months for a shepherd to earn Rs 8 from its three-four sheep. The cost of rearing sheep is much higher. 

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“The wool that we sell is used to stuff mattresses and make carpets,” 22-year-old Lavlesh Pal from Majhari village, Marihan tehsil, told Gaon Connection. 

Shepherds seek government support

“We have to look after the wellbeing of the sheep. There is no help forthcoming from the government by way of medicines or vaccinations,” Phulel complained.  

“I have been herding sheep for 19 years and so far I have seen no schemes to help us nor have I received help of any kind from the government. Only once, the government came forward to inoculate the sheep,” the 34-year-old added. 

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“The government should step forward to provide us with some security so that we can better look after our animals,” said Phulel. That and regular inoculation of our herd so that the animals remain safe, he added.  “It would also help us immensely if there were schemes that would facilitate loans for us to buy and rear sheep,” he told Gaon Connection. If the number of sheep increase, the shepherds sell them off too.

“If there are too many of them, we sell the sheep for three thousand to four thousand rupees each,” Lavlesh Pal from Majhari village, Marihan tehsil, told Gaon Connection. Traders from Delhi and Kanpur visit the sheep herding communities usually in the month of May and June. They buy the sheep for their meat.