The Hindu nationalist government in the western Indian Gujarat state has imposed a ban on the cooking and consumption of non-vegetarian food in all state-owned guest houses and buildings from May 1st, much to the chagrin of some of its members.
"All Gujarat government-owned premises will have to strictly adhere to this rule", said the chief minister, Mr Keshubhai Patel. Scores of Gujarat's district circuit and rest houses, where officials on tour reside, will be forced to turn vegetarian, as will state properties in the federal capital, Delhi, and the financial centre, Bombay.
Although Mr Patel is trying to portray the order enforcing vegetarianism as a collective cabinet decision, some of his colleagues have criticised his arbitrariness. "This decision is ridiculous", said Gujarat's jail minister, Mr Jaspal Singh. "The government cannot snatch away the freedom to choose between vegetarian and non-vegetarian food, deciding on what we can and cannot eat."
Ministers in the state capital, Gandhinager, justify Mr Patel's fiat on the grounds that most people in Gujarat were strict vegetarians anyway and that Mahatma Gandhi, who belonged to the state, fiercely propagated vegetarianism as part of his philosophy of ahimsa or non-violence and sparing the lives of animals. "Vegetarianism is a growing trend. The West is going vegan in a big way so why shouldn't we?" a minister said.
Gujarat's enforced dietary restrictions, however, are bucking the national trend as normally vegetarian Hindus, who form over 80 per cent of India's one billion people, are increasingly eating more meat as social and religious barriers break down in the face of increasing prosperity and the advertising boom.
The National Nutrition Monitoring Bureau at Hyderabad, southern India, said the preference for meat was more prevalent amongst Indians who, for generations, had lived on a vegetarian diet.
