Strangest of all last Sunday, were little cakes of cow dung, wrapped in lots of 5, sold as a mosquito repellant called "sweet dreams".
You break one in half, light it, and then let it smolder away for a night free from airborne poisons (conventional coils release chemical insecticides as they burn) and mosquitoes.
There is precedent for this use of dung. Traditional village homes in rural India have always had a coating of cow dung mixed with clay applied to the walls and floors... to provide insulation and to act as an insect repellant.
Recent research has found that burning cow dung may release antioxidants... and so can help clean polluted air. Is it possible that Mumbaikars, choking in smog, may soon rethink their distaste for the dung of their wandering urban cows?
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