In Nepal, various social conditions and cultural dynamics have begun to profoundly change following a series of political transitions, including democratization in 1990, the second democratization in 2006, and the promulgation of the new constitution in 2015 which declared Nepal a ‘secular state’. These changed political contexts have, in particular, enabled minorities and other oppressed groups to challenge their long-held social and political domination by high-caste Hindus. This study explores the conflicts and tensions that have erupted in recent years between high-caste Hindus and indigenous communities over the significance of the ‘cow’. It suggests that cultural and religious differences are equally revealing of deeper economic inequalities and the differing political imaginations that are now taking center stage in Nepal’s dramatically changed political landscape. Though religious freedom has been firmly instituted by the secular Constitution of Nepal, the slaughter of cows and oxen remains prohibited by law and has oftentimes even led to the arrest and prosecution of people. For the indigenous communities, on the other hand, the cow continues to be on their list of preferred meats in their diet and consequently a source of intense tension with the high-caste Hindus. Confrontations, unsurprisingly, therefore, have erupted both in terms of demonstrations and through aggressive disagreements on social networking sites. This presentation draws on research conducted in Kathmandu and various cities of Eastern Nepal over six months between 2023-24. My ethnography is based on a mix of participant observation, surveys, and interviews through which I have sought to plot the various cultural and social differences that have been expressed by the indigenous communities and the high-caste Hindus over the issue of the cow. In sum, the cow has become central to the making of new political imaginations in contemporary Nepal.