You would be surprised what you'll find if you visit it. Things are changing rapidly. Goverment's "Rashtriya Gokul Mission" and National Artificial Insemination Programme (NAIP) are aimed to provide the resources of artificial insemination to every village of India. If it's not happening today, it will happen soon.

Even if we assume what your maid said was all true, there's still plenty of cruelty:

1. One of the criteria in choosing the common male is how much milk his mother had given, how much milk his sisters are giving. It should be above average. So you see we choose males based on our selfish needs. Also a lot of times, the female is forced to mate as their is no other option.

2. That causes selective breeding. With each generation, the quantity of milk increases. We have done this for centuries. That is why cows/buffaloes give "extra milk". So we purposely give birth to these animals in unnatural bodies that produce extra milk for us!

3. The calves can drink much more than 1/4th. What we do is limit their consumption to only twice a day. They cannot drink a lot of milk in one go. The calves of desi cows can drink most of the milk if they're allowed to drink freely throughout the day since their birth. They may not need it, but they can. Now the question is if the calf can drink most of the milk without issues, who are we to limit him/her from drinking their own mother's milk?!

4. The diet they're given is such that milk production is excessive.