In certain situations like famine, people in Kenya drink blood of cows to survive but they don't kill them or eat their flesh, he said while speaking at a function here.
They insert a tube made of bamboo in the jugular vein of cows and suck blood. But in no way the animal is killed for consumption since there is a ban on cow killing in the African nation, said Bhagwat, a veterinary doctor by training.
His remarks came in the wake of controversy over ban on beef consumption in some States, including Maharashtra, and the recent lynching of a man in Dadri, Uttar Pradesh, after rumours that he and his family ate beef.