mangaluru people for the ethical treatment of animals peta india has urged the karnataka government not to amend the karnataka prevention of cow slaughter and preservation of cattle amendment bill 2020 to allow cow slaughter instead tackle the problem of cow overpopulation in the state by advocating for a vegan lifestyle insteadsuch a move would protect animals help the planet and help improve human health stated dr kiran ahuja manager of vegan projects peta india in a letter written to k venkatesh minister for animal husbandry and sericulture concerned over his statements regarding slaughtering of cows ahuja noted that karnataka could help its dairy farmers transition to producing nondairy milk using crops grown in the state like cashews and millet also the state could help its leather sector take advantage of the rising global interest in animalfriendly and sustainable materials by making leather out of the states grapes instead of cow skin she statedahuja noted that because mother cows and buffaloes must be pregnant or have recently given birth in order to produce milk their bodies are repeatedly violated to be forcibly and crudely artificially inseminated as male calves cannot produce milk they are considered waste by the dairy industry and are typically abandoned left to starve or sent to slaughter when the milk production of female cows and buffaloes wanes they too often end up abandoned on the roads or at the butcher she observedalternatives she said would create new businesses and spare cows and would also help protect from the climate catastrophe quoting our world in data she said cows milk has significantly higher impacts than the plantbased alternatives across all metrics it causes around three times as much greenhouse gas emissions uses around ten times as much land two to twenty times as much freshwater and creates much higher levels of eutrophicationadvocating vegan milks is better for human health ahuja said the academy of nutrition and dietetics state that vegans are at reduced risk of certain health conditions including ischemic heart disease type 2 diabetes hypertension certain types of cancer and obesity