Mancherial man wants cow as national animal, embarks on padayatra

Sandesh Gupta said he along with a group of nine persons belonging to different parts of Telangana and Hyderabad would commence the walkathon at Adishankaracharya temple in Kashmir and end it on March 8, winding through 13 States.

Mancherial: Sandesh Gupta, an animal lover from this town embarked on a padayatra from Kashmir to Kanyakumari on Thursday, spanning a distance of 4,500 kilometres, to spread awareness among the public against slaughtering of cows and to declare cow as a national animal.

Sandesh said he along with a group of nine persons belonging to different parts of Telangana and Hyderabad would commence the walkathon at Adishankaracharya temple in Kashmir and end it on March 8, winding through 13 States. He performed special prayers at a goshala in the town before setting off on the journey.

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He said he took up the cause under the guidance of his teacher Balakrishna. Stating that awareness should be created on the importance of cows in rural parts and cow-based farming must be encouraged to protect cows, he said he had earlier visited 12 Jyotirlingas or abodes of Lord Shiva of the country by commuting on a cycle a distance of 15,000 km in 2022.

The 33-year-old also pedalled from Mancherial to Varanasi, in order to create awareness on deaths of animals by vehicles on national highways covering a distance of 2,750 km in August 2021. Another of his cycle expeditions was from Mancherial to Rameshwaram of Tamil Nadu for the same cause in October 2021.

Sandesh had founded the Friends Animal Trust, a Mancherial-based voluntary organization in 2017. The trust is known for feeding monkeys living on the premises of temples in the district and the neighboring Peddapalli and Jagtial districts, and for conducting final rites of animals that die on roads.