The Una flogging drew nationwide attention after videos showed the five Dalit men tied to a vehicle and publicly whipped by a group of self-styled cow vigilantes near Mota Samadhiyala village in Gir Somnath district of Gujarat on July 11, 2016.
The survivors said the attack forced them to aban-don an occupation their families had depended on for generations. Financial assistance received from Congress MP Rahul Gandhi and BSP chief Mayawati helped them buy four cows and begin earnings through dairy farming instead.
The flogging haunts the men even now. Survivor Vashram Sarvaiya said he was undergoing psychiatric treatment for trauma and was unable to live independ-ently. The others, too, nurse physical and mental wounds that are slow to heal.
The families claimed that rehabilitation prom-ised after the assault largely remained on paper. Balu Sarvaiya, another survivor, is still waiting for “complete justice”. “We have neither received the rehabilitation promised by govt nor the support needed to rebuild our lives. Even after 10 years, we struggle to lead normal lives,” he said.
Then CM Anandiben Patel had announced five acres of agricultural land, residential plots, and govt jobs for us. However, in 2018, Gujarat govt informed the assembly that there was no written record of those an-nouncements, leaving no of-ficial proposal for imple-mentation,” Vashram said. The survivors also alleged that a cheque handed over by a politician had bounced.
In 2016, five Dalit men were assaulted for skinning the car-cass of a cow killed by a lion. The men, from an extended fa-mily, abandoned their traditio-nal work, bought four cows with aid from political parties, and rebuilt their lives around livestock and farming. Last month, lions killed two of tho se cows in separate attacks.
“We have not skinned de-ad cattle since the flogging. We survive on farming and animal husbandry now, but losing two cows has made life difficult again. We are a fami-ly of 18 and loss of cattle has halved our income,” said sur-vivor Vashram Sarvaiya. (source: Times of India, Delhi 11 July 2026, p1 & 3).
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