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Beef showdown between Dalit and Upper caste Hindus at Osmania University

Published on 23 March, 2012
Beef showdown between Dalit and Upper caste Hindus at Osmania University

The right to one's food preference has to be respected as much as the right to avoid a particular food - this is the viable solution to the recent fiasco at the Osmania University campus where students of Dalit Community decided to organise a 'beef festival' to protest against the 'food fascism' of the University administration and 'insult of their food culture by ABVP members'.

OSMANIA UNIVERSITY, the hotbed of Telanaga movement is again in the news – not for the Telangana movement but an unusual ‘beef festival’ that has brought two student communities on the verge of a showdown. While the student wing of Bharatiya Janata Party, Akhil Bhartiya Vidyarthi Parishad (ABVP) is opposing the festival, around a 2000-member strong Dalit student community is vociferous about the festival, scheduled to protest the ‘contempt of their culture and food habits’ by upper caste Hindus.

Dalit students have been demanding that beef should also be served on the non-vegetarian menu that includes chicken, mutton and eggs but so far the University has listened to only upper-castes, ignoring the demands of a majority student community at the campus. ‘Beef is a basic Dalit food,” Kancha Ilaiah, a Dalit ideologue who teaches at the university said, as was quoted by Dalit News.

While the university authorities have denied permission to the event, citing fears of violence on the campus but Dalit students, according to The Telegraph, have accused them of imposing ‘food fascism’. Since India is a secular democracy and all the religions are free to practice their faith but this case definitely points to the dominance of Hindutva ideology over other communities. Going by the constitution of the country, the right of one’s food preference has to be respected as much as another person's right to avoid a particular food but is the university sticking to this stated constitutional position? Obviously not, and it has chosen to give in before a minority community of upper caste Hindus who surreptitiously choose to eat beef as well.

Dalit students have also alleged that ABVP ridicules and insults their food culture on the campus and according to The Times of India, the students, in their petition to VC alleged that ABVP members disrupted their attempt to cook beef in New Research Hotel on March 11.

Several states such as Gujarat, Rajasthan, Madhya Pradesh and Chhattisgarh have banned the cow slaughter but that again highlights the fact that a minority community is suppressed at the cost of majority community. It is like thrusting the vegetarian culture on people who love eating non-vegetarian food and red meat in particular. Only last year when Karnataka assembly passed the controversial ‘cow-slaughter bill’, strong voices were heard, opposing the bill, terming it draconian and ‘anti-people’.

If nothing, such bills and restrictions would lead to the communalisation of people and the polarisation between different communities. The two student communities at the Osmania University campus have already been at loggerheads over the issue of ragging, and Valentine’s Day celebrations but not allowing them to eat the food of their choice amounts to curtailing their fundamental rights.

Mentioning about the issue, one can’t forget to write about the book, “The Myth of the Holy Cow: Beef in Indian dietary Traditions by Professor DN Jha, that was banned in India and the author threatened with anonymous calls and he had to travel from college to his residence only with a police escort. According to New York Times, while cow veneration and vegetarianism may be hallmarks of Hinduism today, Prof Jha compiles copious evidence that this has hardly always been the case. Quoting from the ancient Hindu scriptures, the Vedas (circa 1000 B.C) to epics such as Mahabharata and the Ramayana, Prof Jha argues that ‘the holiness of cow’ is a myth and that its flesh was an essential part of early India non-vegetarian food diet. “Not only were oxen and other animals offered as sacrifices to the Vedic gods, they were routinely eaten by mere mortals as well,” Prof Jha writes.

Even if all that Prof Jha writes or believes is not right, it doesn’t give a University or any other government or private department a license to ban a particular food. India is a land of thousand cultures and languages - what is prohibited to one community, is an essential for other community. Only if this was not a democracy, nobody would have even dared to touch these subjects but if we are to prove that India is the world’s largest democracy with a tolerance towards different cultures, let us try to respect other people’s faiths and sensibilities as well.

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