Prime Minister Narendra Modi will inaugurate the Automated Storage and Retrieval System (ASRS) at Banas Dairy's ultra-high-temperature (UHT) plant in Palanpur, Gujarat, on 30 October 2026. The ₹31.14 crore facility marks the cooperative's first foray into full supply chain automation, extending its technology adoption beyond milk processing and packaging.

What the Automated Warehouse Can Do

The ASRS warehouse spans 30,000 square feet and is designed to store up to 11,000 pallets across nine levels of high-density steel racks. Robotic shuttles handle all movement and retrieval of goods, meaning the entire facility can be operated by as few as five to ten employees — a fraction of the workforce required in a conventional warehouse.

The system uses a 'mother-child' shuttle arrangement: a larger mother shuttle carries a smaller child shuttle to the required rack lane, where the child shuttle places or retrieves individual pallets and boxes. Positions of all incoming pallets are recorded automatically in specialised software, and when a specific product or batch is needed, the system identifies its location and routes it directly to the dispatch area — eliminating manual searches across thousands of pallets.

Products and Plant Details

The warehouse will primarily serve Banas Dairy's UHT plant, which was established in Palanpur in 2015 and currently processes around 5.5 lakh litres of milk daily. The plant recorded annual revenue of ₹1,050 crore in 2025-26 and operates at approximately 90 per cent of its peak capacity.

Products stored in the new warehouse include Cow-Buffalo Gold milk, High Protein Lassi, Apple Tru, and Tea Special, among others. The UHT heat treatment process allows these products to remain shelf-stable for up to six months without refrigeration or preservatives. Banas Dairy exports its products to Singapore, the Maldives, the United Arab Emirates, and Malaysia, in addition to markets across India.

Why This Matters for Banas Dairy

Traditional warehouses rely on forklifts that require wide aisles and large floor areas, making high-density storage impractical and batch-tracking cumbersome. The ASRS addresses both constraints through computerised inventory management and faster retrieval. The software also enables end-to-end traceability — tracking each batch from packing through to dispatch, including quality-inspection triggers.

This installation represents a significant expansion of Banas Dairy's automation journey, which until now had been concentrated in processing and packaging lines. Notably, the move comes as Indian dairy cooperatives face increasing pressure to reduce logistics costs and improve cold-chain efficiency.

Banas Dairy at a Glance

Established in 1969, Banas Dairy collects an average of 83 lakh litres of milk daily from more than 4.5 lakh livestock-rearing farmers through 1,505 village-level milk cooperative societies. The cooperative posted a turnover of more than ₹21,200 crore in 2024-25, with 82 per cent of total revenue returned directly to farmers as remuneration — an unusually high farmer-payout ratio in the dairy sector.

Prime Minister Modi's presence at the inauguration underscores the political and economic significance of cooperative dairy infrastructure in Gujarat, a state that is also home to Amul's parent body, the Gujarat Cooperative Milk Marketing Federation (GCMMF). The event is expected to draw attention to the cooperative model as a template for rural economic empowerment.