{"id":20365,"date":"2015-12-29T09:00:30","date_gmt":"2015-12-29T17:00:30","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/spijue.wpengine.com\/news\/cow-dung-patties-selling-like-hot-cakes-online-in-india\/"},"modified":"2015-12-29T09:00:30","modified_gmt":"2015-12-29T17:00:30","slug":"cow-dung-patties-selling-like-hot-cakes-online-in-india","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.juneauempire.com\/news\/cow-dung-patties-selling-like-hot-cakes-online-in-india\/","title":{"rendered":"Cow dung patties selling like hot cakes online in India"},"content":{"rendered":"

NEW DELHI \u2014<\/strong> Like consumers around the globe, Indians are flocking to the online marketplace in droves these days. But there\u2019s one unusual item flying off the virtual shelves: Online retailers say cow dung patties are selling like hot cakes.<\/p>\n

The patties \u2014 cow poop mixed with hay and dried in the sun, made mainly by women in rural areas and used to fuel fires \u2014 have long been available in India\u2019s villages. But online retailers including Amazon and eBay are now reaching out to the country\u2019s ever-increasing urban population, feeding into the desire of older city folks to harken back to their childhood in the village.<\/p>\n

Some retailers say they\u2019re offering discounts for large orders. Some customers are asking for gift wrapping.<\/p>\n

The orders come mostly from cities where it would be difficult to buy dung cakes, she said.<\/p>\n

In India, where Hindus have long worshipped cows as sacred, cow dung cakes have been used for centuries for fires, whether for heating, cooking or Hindu rituals. Across rural India, piles of drying cow dung are ubiquitous.<\/p>\n

Radhika Agarwal of ShopClues, a major online retailer in India, said demand for the cow dung cakes spiked during the recent Diwali festival season, a time when Hindus conduct prayer ceremonies at their homes, factories and offices. On a recent day, ShopClues\u2019 website showed that the patties had sold out.<\/p>\n

\u201cAround Diwali, when people do a lot of pujas in their homes and workplaces, there is a lot of demand for cow dung cakes,\u201d said Agarwal, referring to rituals performed during the popular festival.<\/p>\n

\u201cIncreasingly, in the cold weather, people are keeping themselves warm by lighting fires\u201d at outdoor events, she said, adding that people who grew up in rural areas find the peaty smell of dung fires pleasant.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt reminds them of the old days,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n

Online retailers said people were also buying the dung cakes to light fires for ritual ceremonies to mark the beginning of the new year and for the winter festival known as Lohri, celebrated in northern India.<\/p>\n

The cakes are sold in packages that contain two to eight pieces weighing 200 grams (7 ounces) each. Prices range from 100 to 400 rupees ($1.50 to $6) per package.<\/p>\n

Dung cakes are also used as organic manure, and some sellers are marketing them for use in kitchen gardens.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

NEW DELHI \u2014 Like consumers around the globe, Indians are flocking to the online marketplace<\/a> in droves these days. But there\u2019s one unusual item flying off the virtual shelves: Online retailers say cow dung patties are selling like hot cakes. The patties \u2014 cow poop mixed with hay and dried in the sun, made mainly […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":107,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_stopmodifiedupdate":false,"_modified_date":"","wds_primary_category":4,"footnotes":""},"categories":[4],"tags":[65],"yst_prominent_words":[],"class_list":["post-20365","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-news","tag-nation-world"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.juneauempire.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/20365","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.juneauempire.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.juneauempire.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.juneauempire.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/107"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.juneauempire.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=20365"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.juneauempire.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/20365\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.juneauempire.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=20365"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.juneauempire.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=20365"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.juneauempire.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=20365"},{"taxonomy":"yst_prominent_words","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.juneauempire.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/yst_prominent_words?post=20365"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}