India’s “vegetarian” supremacism is increasingly turning into an absurd competition among its “devotees,” each seeking “international” recognition for their “great” culture and “diversity.” Over the last decade, we have seen how these so-called “cultural warriors” are paraded in various Western capitals whenever Narendra Modi visits. Events are organised to “project” India’s cultural heritage—often presenting a predominantly vegetarian image, particularly the Gujarati-Jain-Marwari variety, as though it represents India as a whole.
There is nothing wrong with feeling proud of one’s cultural values or promoting them, as long as doing so does not offend others or violate their basic human dignity. There are hundreds of millions of vegetarians who do not hate or look down upon meat eaters. Vegetarianism, for many, is simply a personal or cultural choice.
In my own family, my mother was a vegetarian, but she would cook the best meat dishes whenever we had guests during my childhood. Many forms of Devi Puja and worship of local deities in the Himalayan regions have traditionally involved animal sacrifice. Goats, yaks and lambs have historically been part of the economy and subsistence of communities that depend on them; they are not simply animals kept for ritual purposes.
I have also visited the homes of friends in southern India who are vegetarian themselves but happily cook delicious meat dishes for guests or family members who eat meat. For them, vegetarianism is a choice, not something to preach to others as the definitive expression of their “culture.”
I love all kinds of food that are edible and available. Whenever I visit my sister in Uttarakhand, she knows that I have specifically asked her not to cook meat for me. I would rather eat the enormous variety of local cuisine. The range of vegetarian food in the Himalayan region is extraordinary: different varieties of rajma, soybeans, leafy vegetables and countless other local preparations. We do not necessarily eat the same food for lunch and dinner because there is such a wide variety available.
Nobody eats a particular food merely to appease or offend someone else. What we did respect in my family was each person’s food preference. My mother would ensure that the same utensils were not used for cooking vegetarian and meat dishes. That was not an act of superiority; it was simply a way of respecting individual food values.
Food Is Geography, Climate and History
We should understand that our food habits did not develop merely because of what we individually “love.” Geography, climate, agriculture and local economies have shaped what communities eat.
Food traditions in central India, for example, evolved in response to its climatic conditions. In oppressive heat, mattha or buttermilk can be refreshing and sustaining. Poha and dhokla have become popular far beyond their regions of origin. In North India, paranthas remain a familiar breakfast, while southern dishes such as upma, idli, vada, sambar and rasam have become equally popular across the country.
India’s food culture is not a single tradition. It is a collection of thousands of traditions shaped by ecology, history, migration, trade, caste, community and local agriculture.
Unfortunately, Indians do not always seem to enjoy this diversity when they travel. We often want to take our own food with us rather than experience what the place we are visiting has to offer.
I have seen groups of North Indians travelling to South India carrying enough food to avoid eating local cuisine. When travelling internationally, I have seen Gujarati friends carry their own food because finding vegetarian meals can be difficult in parts of Southeast Asia, Africa or Latin America. Europe, the United Kingdom and the United States have large Indian communities and restaurants, making Indian food relatively easy to find. Elsewhere, however, travellers may have to make an effort to understand local food practices.
Even within India, large groups often prefer particular hotels and community-run establishments. At major religious destinations, powerful communities have established their own dharmshalas, rest houses and kitchens. Jains, Gujaratis, Marwaris, Sikhs and others have created institutions where people can maintain familiar dietary practices while travelling.
There is nothing inherently wrong with that.
The problem begins when a personal or community preference is transformed into a claim of cultural superiority.
Vegetarianism Versus “Non-Vegetarianism”
The issue in India is not simply vegetarianism versus meat eating. I have never liked the term “non-veg,” because it subtly creates a hierarchy in which vegetarian food becomes “normal” or “pure” while everything else is defined by what it supposedly is not.
Meat eating has been part of human societies across the world, particularly among communities whose livelihoods developed around pastoralism, hunting, fishing and difficult mountain environments. In many cold and mountainous regions, meat and traditional alcoholic beverages became part of local diets because of geography, climate and economic necessity.
India itself contains enormous diversity in meat consumption.
Many Indians eat chicken, goat meat or fish. Beef is not consumed by many communities, while pork has traditionally been important among several indigenous and regional communities. There are also differences within meat-eating communities over halal and jhatka practices and over methods of slaughter.
Vegetarian food is equally diverse. Gujaratis may have dietary preferences very different from those of Rajasthanis. The dal eaten in Uttar Pradesh or Bihar may taste very different from the food preferred in the Himalayan states. In Punjab and Delhi, people may love maa ki dal and rajma-chawal. Telangana cuisine is not the same as Tamil or Kerala cuisine.
This is precisely what makes India’s food culture extraordinary.
When Culture Becomes a Weapon
What we have witnessed in recent years, however, is an increasingly aggressive attempt to present meat eaters as somehow morally inferior.
The public visibility of self-styled spiritual leaders who lecture people about food, culture and morality has grown enormously. Their influence is amplified by television and social media, and sometimes by political patronage. The presentation of India’s food culture at high-profile international events has also generated debates about whether the country is presenting its diversity or selectively presenting one particular cultural image.
There is nothing wrong with India showcasing vegetarian cuisine to foreign dignitaries. India has an extraordinary vegetarian culinary tradition, and it should certainly be celebrated.
But India also has an extraordinary non-vegetarian culinary tradition.
Why should one be presented as the authentic India while the other is treated as something embarrassing or undesirable?
India’s guests should be respected, just as Indians expect their dietary, religious and cultural preferences to be respected when they travel abroad.
Former President of Iceland Ólafur Ragnar GrÃmsson made this point when he recalled hosting the Indian president for a state dinner more than two decades ago. He noted that he had served an entirely vegetarian menu, despite Iceland not being an easy place for vegetarians.
The larger lesson is important: hospitality means understanding the preferences and sensitivities of your guest.
The same principle should apply in India.
We Should Travel to Experience, Not Impose
Some of the best tourists are those willing to taste local food and experience local culture. Unfortunately, we often travel without wanting to leave our own cultural comfort zones.
A group travels to another part of India and searches for the same food it eats at home. A group goes abroad and complains that local restaurants do not provide the food it expects. A community establishes its own facilities so that its members never have to experience the local culinary culture.
Again, there is nothing wrong with wanting familiar food.
But money does not buy the right to disregard local sensitivities. Travellers should make an effort to understand the culture of the places they visit.
The same principle applies to religious and cultural practices abroad.
Recent controversies involving Indian residents or visitors in foreign countries—from disputes over dietary practices to attempts to organise religious ceremonies in prominent public spaces—should remind us that cultural expression exists within a framework of local laws and public norms.
Our feelings matter.
So do the feelings of others.
From Vegetarian Preference to Vegetarian Theocracy
The larger danger is not vegetarianism itself. It is the transformation of a dietary preference into a social hierarchy.
Democracy may ultimately involve numbers, but democracy also requires space for difference. A numerical majority cannot turn its cultural preferences into compulsory social norms simply because it has greater political or economic influence.
India’s problem is therefore much bigger than the debate between meat eaters and vegetarians.
Consider the recent attempts by community leaders in parts of Maharashtra to tell people what they should or should not eat during religious festivals. The argument can begin with meat and gradually move to garlic, onion and other foods. Eventually, the question is no longer whether someone is vegetarian. It becomes whether they are permitted to enjoy the kind of vegetarian food they themselves prefer.
A self-styled religious leader travels to Bengal and lectures Bengalis about eating meat. But Bengal’s cultural traditions cannot be separated from fish, and many forms of Durga worship have their own long-established food and ritual traditions.
The lesson should be obvious: India cannot be understood through a single dietary template.
Its diversity is reflected not only in languages, clothing, music and religious practices, but also in kitchens.
The Politics of Controlling Everyday Life
I have long argued that India’s social and economic inequalities cannot be understood without examining the concentration of economic and political power. The growing influence of wealthy interests, concentrated media ownership and powerful social institutions has consequences for how public culture is shaped.
The emergence of new-age gurus and self-appointed cultural authorities is not merely a religious phenomenon. They increasingly participate in defining what is supposedly respectable, moral or authentically Indian.
When superstition and irrational claims are promoted as “culture,” and when every social disagreement is converted into a question of religious or cultural identity, democratic debate becomes narrower.
We are repeatedly told that the modern world is about individual freedom and personal choice. Capitalism is often presented as giving individuals the freedom to decide how they live. Liberal democracies place considerable emphasis on individual rights.
Yet in India, we increasingly see public debates about what people should eat, whom they should love and how they should live.
The kitchen and the bedroom are becoming political battlegrounds.
That should concern everyone, regardless of what they eat.
India Cannot Afford to Become Monolithic
India’s strength has never been its uniformity.
Its strength is its extraordinary ability to accommodate difference.
A vegetarian from Gujarat, a meat eater from Nagaland, a fish-eating Bengali, a pork-eating tribal community, a Jain from Rajasthan, a Sikh from Punjab, a Muslim from Uttar Pradesh, a Hindu from Uttarakhand and a Christian from Kerala may all have completely different food traditions—and all of them are Indian.
There is no contradiction in this.
The contradiction arises only when one group decides that its own traditions are the definition of India and everyone else must conform.
We should therefore move beyond these artificial cultural battles. Otherwise, we risk isolating ourselves from the very diversity that has historically made India interesting to the world.
India’s cultural diversity is one of its greatest strengths. Any attempt to turn that diversity into something monolithic or homogeneous will ultimately weaken social cohesion.
Let people eat what they want.
Let communities celebrate their traditions.
Let people travel without being forced to abandon their own choices.
But let us also learn to respect the choices of others.
Those in positions of political and social authority have an especially important responsibility here. When political leaders remain silent while extra-state actors attempt to impose cultural preferences on others, such behaviour can become normalised.
If we expect people in Western countries to respect Indian culture, food, music, religion and traditions, we must also be willing to respect the cultural and democratic rights of others.
We want democracies abroad to protect immigrants.
We ask other societies to respect our religious and cultural practices.
We expect foreign governments to accommodate our dietary choices.
All of that is legitimate.
But respect cannot be a one-way demand.
If India wants the world to appreciate its extraordinary diversity, India must first learn to appreciate it itself.
Vilifying citizens because of what they eat—or because their cultural practices do not conform to the preferences of a powerful majority—will not make India stronger.
It will only make the country smaller.
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*Human rights defender
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