Of Castes and Kitchens: a conversation with Devdutt Pattnaik

Neha Lamba Grover: Hello everyone, welcome back to No Forks Given. Today I have with me mythologist, writer, and illustrator Devdutt Pattnaik. welcome to the podcast, Devdutt.

Devdutt: Thank you. Thank you for inviting me.

Neha Lamba Grover: I I am very excited to have you on today because the concept of No Forks Given is to discuss social identities with food as a metaphor, and that is an idea that that's been a r recurring theme in a lot of your writing and conversations. So I'd love to, go straight to asking you Why do you think food is so central to social identities across the world?

Devdutt: So let me begin by asking you, what's your earliest memory at home with

Neha Lamba Grover: Yeah.

Devdutt: of a Hindu practice? Assuming you're a Hindu. I don't I'm sorry, I didn't check. So just tell me what is

Neha Lamba Grover: Yeah, yeah, I I am a Hindu. I am a Hindu.

Devdutt: the first memory that you have that made you of a Hindu memory, whatever you whatever you call Hindu memory.

Neha Lamba Grover: Okay. A Hindu memory is of me falling off a chair, bumping my head, and then I have this vague memory of being taken to a temple because I I'm assuming now in hindsight people thought I may have had a concussion. and something to do with and you know prashad or something must have been offered or that that definitely is it.

Devdutt: So look at the word you used now. You use the word prasad.

Neha Lamba Grover: Yeah.

Devdutt: So you can't talk of a Hindu religious expression without using the word prasad or food. Hinduism

Neha Lamba Grover: Yeah.

Devdutt: is built around food. Everything is about food. There's nothing but food. It's just that nobody realizes it. We just do it so unconsciously. Hindu Hinduism has nothing to do with Vedanta and Vivekananda and Iskcon and Shiva Krishna. None of it.

Neha Lamba Grover: Mm-hmm.

Devdutt: At its very foundation, it's a religion about food and it's about what women do at home. So every festival in the house, the mother will do a vrat and she will fast, she will do her, she will dress in a particular way, she will arrange the house in a particular way, and she'll cook a particular kind of food. And she'll say, on Monday I'll do this, or it'll be on every Thursday I'll do this, or every Ekadashi I'll do this, or every summer I will do this. There will be something around food which is around the house, which is controlled by the lady of the house. And that is the most basic Hinduism. Nothing else is Hinduism. Everything else is built on top of it, people appropriating it. But foundational Hinduism is the kitchen.

Neha Lamba Grover: So that that so that's interesting because the other core memory I have is of these Friday fasts that my mother used to keep. And I just look forward to the moment where you know, you would I don't know, there was

Devdutt: Ha ha ha.

Neha Lamba Grover: this little veil in front of the deity. And it would get pulled and you got prashad, but I think very often my dad every now and then would get us chocolates, but he never they were always kept behind the curtain in the temple, or they would tell us to in that little altar that we had at home and we had to pray really hard. And when you unveiled it there was a little gift there, a five-star chocolate or something.

Devdutt: Okay.

Neha Lamba Grover: But funnily enough, my mother did not grow up practicing this Santoshi Mata fast. She didn't know how to do it. She was constantly asking people because she grew up in a village in Rajasthan and then got married and moved to Haryana. So wherever there were neighbors who were keeping it, she would ask them how to keep it. She read this story of the Santoshi Mata, and that was another aspect of Hinduism that I mean, the two big fasts I've ever seen her keep for one was in her early years, this one, and the second was Karvachauth, and neither were fasts that she grew up keeping, you know, or observances.

Devdutt: Yeah. So you know these these are observances which are found. And if you read a Vratakatha, it'll always be a woman doesn't know something has gone wrong in her life. She doesn't know she's restless, her husband has not come back, or she's not getting married, or the children are sick, or something very ordinary

Neha Lamba Grover: Yeah, yeah.

Devdutt: domestic issue. Then she will see a group of women doing some puja, and then the woman will say, you do do do this, this, this, this, this, cook this, eat this on this date, avoid this, do this. It'll be very simple practice. And remember your mother's story is exactly like a Vratkatha. It's like you could have actually written a little chap book saying that, you know, she was from this privilege, she came here, something happened, she felt and she felt this pull, and then she met this lady in the neighborhood, and the neighborhood lady said, Do this, and she did this, and she felt good. That's

Neha Lamba Grover: Yeah.

Devdutt: it. That's Hinduism. That's the most prevalent form of Hinduism that exists globally. Everything else is just. On top of that. But this is the foundation.

Neha Lamba Grover: Yeah.

Devdutt: That woman of the house will do it. It will be something to do with feasting and fasting. It

Neha Lamba Grover: Yeah.

Devdutt: will involve a goddess. It will involve her home, her family, good things for the family. She wants that's her control mechanism. Then, how does she ensure that her family is taken care of? All good things happen. That's it. It's as simple as that. There's nothing, no high philosophy, no none of this. None of that Bhagavad Gita and all that. None of that The genuine Hinduism.

Neha Lamba Grover: So, so you know, there's this philosophical side to Hinduism, we also talk about deep, you know, knowledge of the scriptures, etc. How do you then I mean, I've always thought of it as the cycle of creation and destruction, the holy trinity of Brahma, Vishnu, Mahesh. Where does hunger come in there and you know, food and hunger? Where's that wh wh how is that the core then?

Devdutt: See, the need to make Hinduism philosophical came with the colonial powers. They said that to be a religion, you must have a core philosophy, you must have a book, you must have a god, you must have a prophet. They gave a checklist. And you know, all the Brahmin men ran around and all the Bhadralok and the elites of India decided that what a religion is supposed to be. It was decided by elite men, right? And it's a that's a tiny, tiny proportion of India. Unfortunately, they have the most power and the most visible. And therefore, we start assuming for the last hundred, two hundred years, they are the ones who are writing all the papers, they are the ones who are appearing in all the podcasts, and we start assuming that this is Hinduism. But if you look at the history of Hinduism, let's ask the Vedas and all these things, high philosophy, they were very clear will be only accessible to men, not to women. So if there are hundred Hindus, fifty percent of those Hindus are out. They are not getting access to the Vedas. Then amongst the men, they will say the Shudras should not get access, which is another forty. So out of hundred Hindus, only ten Hindus got access to the Vedas and all these Vedic philosophies. The rest of them get access to stories and the home rituals. So only two things stories and home rituals. These are the foundation of Hinduism. The stories that you hear, that you have been listening, and through the stories, some ideas will start emerging and appearing to you, which you may like and you may not like. But what is foundational is food.

Neha Lamba Grover: Yeah.

Devdutt: And that is very important. And it's food is not you know, food is a complex thing because it's both real food and it's also metaphorical food. Which nowadays people are understanding, you know, when we say that, she is an attention seeking person.

Neha Lamba Grover: Hmm.

Devdutt: But that is there in Hinduism all the time. Dhyando, unko dhyando, dhyando, bhagwan kiva dhyando. God wants attention, give him attention. That's all you're saying. It's just that now you're using this big English word called dhyandena. So Dhyana is just attention, but it's just that we we understood long ago that humans have a hunger for attention. We have a hunger, need for praise, we have a need for food, we have a need for clothing, food, clothing, shelter, which is all everybody talks about, but that's not everything that we want. We also want attention. We also want knowledge. We also want praise. We want to feel secure. We have these all these hungers. And humans, Indi Hinduism understood this long, long right at the beginning, right at the start of everything. So in the beginning, it is

Neha Lamba Grover: So food

Devdutt: not about God. It's about food.

Neha Lamba Grover: but we also offer food to the gods and I you know, referring to the Prasad thing, we receive food at the end of the prayer.

Devdutt: So you give food in order to receive food. So this is the sick cycle. See, in the early days, you had a fire altar and they would put fire. Now that you cannot get anything back because everything is given away

Neha Lamba Grover: Yeah.

Devdutt: because it's in the fire. What is left behind, the surplus, is called Uchishta. And that

Neha Lamba Grover: Mm-hmm.

Devdutt: is what the family will eat. So even today you will see many, many Orthodox Hindus when they s when you serve them food, they will take a little bit of the rice and keep it outside the plate. And they will say, this is for the gods, this is for the crow, this is for something depending on how orthodox they are.

Neha Lamba Grover: Yeah, yeah, mm-hmm.

Devdutt: And even if you're taking alcohol, you'll first offer it to the gods. And then you'll drink alcohol. So you take the beer and then you'll first flick it in every direction so that all the gods are happy and then you drink your beer. So it's a practice that is even to default.

Neha Lamba Grover: So that so the term pure veg and non-veg are very unique to India. you know, the pure veg conversation. And in India there is a push towards vegetarianism, as though being a good Hindu means you have to be vegetarian. I think it was in March earlier this year where a group of Muslims had some chicken biryani on the Ganges River and were incarcerated, etc. I saw some writing that you had put out there about the Ramayan where Sita did offer something similar to the Ganges. Biryani to the Ganges. How have we forgotten that?

Devdutt: Yeah, she offers biryani to the Ganges. It's very clean. It's just called Mamso Dana.

Neha Lamba Grover: Yeah. But how have we

Devdutt: See the thing?

Neha Lamba Grover: forgotten that? We talked about the judge talked about that act by the Muslims who were you know basically it was an iftar meal that they were having on the Ganges offending the Hindu sentiment, and yet one of the core scriptures of Hindus, or in at least in modern day acknowledged to be the core scripture, talks about a very similar meal. So how did we forget that?

Devdutt: So it's not just about Hindu. Globally, fragility is being celebrated and the resilience is not being celebrated. Everybody wants to be fragile. So if you look about 10 years ago in America, there was this safe space, trigger words. You were getting triggered by everything and safe spaces. So Hindus, you know, and I always forgive me, but I blame the NRIs, they brought these words to India and they said, now let's get triggered by anything that we see. We'll get triggered, we want safe spaces, and all the judges are ready to protect these. simple Hindus who get triggered at the sight of non vegetarian food. So you know, at one time we used to celebrate the yogis, used to sleep on you know, bed of nails, used to walk on nails,

Neha Lamba Grover: Yeah.

Devdutt: walk on fire. That was resilience, right? Those symbols of resilience. Now we have become this little children's mummy, mummy, hamkup taklifu. I saw non veg, I ate non veg, I saw this, I saw that. And fragility has become the proof that you are a Hindu. And this is unfortunate because you have created a new kind of Hinduism, which is 100 years old. Because when Hinduism, when we constructed the religion called Hinduism, Hinduism is caste. And we had, you know, we are all Hinduism primarily is an ethnic identity. You are born, it's like Han Chinese or Shinto Japanese. You can't become a Han. You can't say, hey, today I've decided to become a Han. Or you can't say that you have become a Shinto. You're born into a Japanese family, you're automatically part of the Shinto ecosystem. You're born into a Chinese family, you're born into a Han ecosystem. You're born into a Hindu family, you are born a Hindu. Now, with that comes a caste, with that comes a set of practices, whatever your mother as father will teach you. There is no universal Hindu idea. No such thing ever. The British said you should have something universal. And therefore, in the 19th century, we started creating a new Hinduism. The Bengalis were there first because. You know, that's where the British started the empire. So you'll see Raja Ram Mohan Roy, Vivekanand giving their talks because they're all Bengalis. Aurobindo, Iskon comes from Bengal, and all those Bengali ideas become Hindu ideas at one time. Now, then what happened over time is that the business communities, the Gujaratis, the Ra Marvadis, the Vaishnavs, the Jains, they've sp went abroad, they went to Africa, they went to Europe, they became very powerful. They fund all the temples in India, they fund all the publishing houses in India, they control the media. They decided that my caste practice will become the Hindu practice. So every caste is trying to promote its practice as the Hindu practice. And that's how Hinduism suddenly you'll find because you know we are in a capitalist society where money decides everything. And if it's like America has vetoed powers, right, in the United Nations.

Neha Lamba Grover: Yeah, yeah.

Devdutt: In the same way, the rich Bania lobby of India has veto powers. They decide. What Hinduism should be. And you know, RSS is funded by them, VHP is funded by them, Congress is funded by them, BJP is funded by them. Everybody's funded by them because they are the ones who have the money. Nobody else has the money, that's surplus cash. You know, so it's the business lobby. Most of them are vegetarian. 90% of them are vegetarian. The Jains, the Marvadis, the Swaminarayans, all Swaminarayan temples, they were Patels, they Patedars. And 200 years ago, they decided to become vegetarian. And under a Guruji, they joined the Swami Narayan, which is highly monastic, and they've decided that vegetarianism becomes a proxy for purity. So it's a purity game. So I always tell people that 95% of the world eats meat. 5%

Neha Lamba Grover: Yeah.

Devdutt: of the world is vegetarian. Of that, 4% is pure vegetarian, and they're all caste-obsessed. They will are obsessed with caste, they believe in untouchability. They will not let you enter their utensils have to be kept pure. They will not let you use their toilet. They will not let you enter their houses. So caste, you don't use the word caste anymore. You use food. That's the new word. So anybody who says I'm pure

Neha Lamba Grover: Yeah.

Devdutt: vegetarian is basically telling you or signaling that he is on top of the caste hierarchy.

Neha Lamba Grover: So, Devdutt, are you saying veget you know, even in the West, most people assume that if you're Indian, even before they even know your religion, they assume you're going to be vegetarian. It's become a part of our social identity as well. Even in restaurants, especially when it comes to beef, but other meats as well, they'll they won't be so sure that you'll have it. But either, I mean, are you saying Hinduism does not prescribe vegetarianism? and Back to also that question about the Ganges and Ramayan, either it's written in the Ramayan that Sita offered biryani, or it isn't. How does I mean most other religions of the world will quote a sh from a scripture and say this is what they ate? How do we

Devdutt: So let me clarify. I use the word Hindu as an ethnic identity and I linked it with caste. I didn't say it's religion. Religion

Neha Lamba Grover: Yeah. Mm-hmm.

Devdutt: was an imposition on us by the colonial past. They said you have to be a religion. Religion, by definition, is something you convert into or convert out of. So it's a club. You have to join in.

Neha Lamba Grover: Yeah. Yeah.

Devdutt: So Christian, you can become a Christian or stop being a Christian. You can become a Muslim and you can stop being a Muslim. You can become a Buddhist and stop being a Buddhist. But you can't do that with Hinduism. You can't. It's only in the last hundred years you have created this new Hinduism that you can become part of. All those Gurujis have their ashrams, they are like, you know, spiritual Disneylands. You can go there, you can cosplay, you can wear whatever you want. You become vegetarian for seven days. You say Hare Rama, Harai Rama, you do, you know, dance in front of the gods and say, main gopi hun, and I'll behave like a child. So seven days of cosplay, you're spiritual, fantastic. You know, all the Hollywood stars can become Hindu for seven days, because now it's a religion. So it's like, you know, it's a new business model, very very powerful business model. But the point is, it's not Hinduism. Hinduism, you are born to Hinduism. Nobody can become a Hindu. Nobody can become my caste. You can't. I mean, no matter how much you try, you can't become it. That's the truth of the religion. So let's clarify the definition of ethnic identity and religion. Now, Islam and

Neha Lamba Grover: Okay. Mm-hmm.

Devdutt: Christianity are religions where it's what is a religion? It's prescriptive. It'll tell you how to live your life. So Muslims can't do anything unless they get permission from Allah, Muhammad, Adiths. So if you know, I you know my Muslim friends will say we are not homophobic, but Our religion has told us to be homophobic. So we are homophobic. We are not homophobic at all, but you our God has told us to be homophobic. So this kind of bizarre logic where you have the religion telling you how to live your life. So now you live your caste rules. Now, what Ramayan says, what Mahabharata says, has no hold on your life. It's just a book through which you understand Hindu's traditional history, mythological history. You try to understand how society emerges. The purpose of Ramayana is to explain. How a good king maintains integrity and the price of integrity. It has nothing to do with what he ate and what he did not eat. Dashrath had three wives. Doesn't mean Hindus are allowed to have three wives. So when we talk about polygamy of Dashrath, do we say Hindus are allowed to have multiple wives? No. So how does it matter what Ram ate or Sita ate? That being said, now let's look

Neha Lamba Grover: Hmm.

Devdutt: at it. They used to eat meat, they used to drink, they used to have mahua. Wine, they used make wine from grapes, it was not there. So it was imported from Rome. But the Satavahan period, you have all kinds of wine. Balaram's wine is toddy wine. Mahua is offered. Mahua is a very famous wine which is offered. Rice beer is offered. In fact, Sita makes a dialogue to Ra Ravan saying that someone who is raised drinking mahua and honeymead and will not touch rice wine. So she Com she uses alcohol as a gradient to say that you are as you know you are as cheap as rice wine, while I have been raised with these advanced like it's a it's a these metaphors are used casually. Satya Bama and Draupadi are known to be drinking in Mahabharata. Nobody thought much about it. This was the Vedic period, everybody drank and everybody ate every kind of food. It's these, you know, it's a you know a phenomena which has emerged in the last couple of centuries. And really it's the Baniya lobby which has made this, because the Baniya lobby is Most of them were ex-Jains, ex-Buddhists, and Buddhism and Jainism had these. And trade communities around the world are very strict about food. You'll see Jewish people are very strict about food.

Neha Lamba Grover: Mm-hmm. Yeah.

Devdutt: Arabs are very strict about food. These are trading communities. So around the world, a trading community, you will see the Arabs, the Jews, and the Maravadis, the Jains, they would be very strict food habits because that was a way of proving integrity. Like

Neha Lamba Grover: Mm-hmm.

Devdutt: Inko. Like imagine if you have a Muslim trader and he says, No, I will die, but I will only eat halal food. If you give me anything else, I will not eat. Now you say,

Neha Lamba Grover: Hmm.

Devdutt: My God, this man is willing to die for his food. I trust him with my money. It creates an ecosystem of trust, which is what the Jewish people understood. This is what the Arabs understood. This is what the Jains understood. So typically, the Marwad, the Baniya lobby, is obsessed with food fidelity. But it's a caste habit. It's their caste habit, it's not a Hindu habit. It's a caste habit. And everybody has a right to follow their caste if they believe that is important, because otherwise they may be ostracized in their caste. But those rules don't apply to everybody.

Neha Lamba Grover: But why did the trading Why did the trading community of the Hindus choose vegetarianism? When it when did it was it always that the trading community was vegetarian? Was it prescribed? I mean, there is this concept of Rajasik, Tamsic, Satvik food in you know, in Hinduism as well. At what stage did that? Sorry?

Devdutt: So Rajasic Tamasic So Rajasic Tamasic and Satvic does not exist in Ayurveda. It's not an Ayurveda concept. So first let's

Neha Lamba Grover: Okay. And yet very often that I mean, I I'm pretty sure I have I have talked about it and referred to Ayurveda

Devdutt: Good thing.

Neha Lamba Grover: because one just Ayurveda being

Devdutt: No, it's not an Ayurveda branch.

Neha Lamba Grover: such an old science of we I don't know, nutritional

Devdutt: Fool.

Neha Lamba Grover: well being, you assume and then there's this intrinsic conversation around the three kinds of food. One assumes it's coming out of that scripture, but it you you know, you're saying it doesn't. Yeah.

Devdutt: No. First, it's not there in Ayurveda. Ayurveda, their sattva rajas is only mental states. So alert a very alert state is when you're very alert and awakened and fresh, that is a sattvik state. When you're very aggressive and you're in the mood to get things done, then you are in a rajasic state, when you're dull, confused, evening, it's evening time and you're tired, then you are in the tamasic state. So we go through a cycle, it's just regular eight hours, eight hour cycle. In the morning, when you wake up, you are. You're fresh and awake and you're clear in your head, you are sattvik. And as the day progresses, you want your tea and coffee to keep you going. You are in the Rajasik state. In the evening, you're tired, you're exhausted, you sit down, you're not preparing to sleep. Tamasik. It's as simple as that. Nothing to do with food. The words appear for the first time, they're coming from Sankhya, that is Tantric, Proto-Tantric,

Neha Lamba Grover: Okay.

Devdutt: and it comes into Bhagavad Gita. And even in Bhagavad Gita, he never mentions a food item. I

Neha Lamba Grover: Okay.

Devdutt: mean, you read the Bhagavad Gita verses, there are three verses, you read this carefully. There is not a mention of a single food item. In fact, if you want to be actually what Krishna told me, he says salt and spices cause misery and they are rajasik. Which means if you add salt or any spice to your food, it has stopped being sattvik. So when anybody says, that is not sattvik. That is not sattvik. You can't eat salt. So if you see a proper upavasa, will be fresh food which is not add, they will not add salt.

Neha Lamba Grover: Yeah, yeah.

Devdutt: So it is fresh fruits, fresh vegetables, fresh everything fresh and barely cooked. So, you know, meat, how will you eat meat? Only fresh fish can be eaten like that, the way the Chinese eat it, or the Japanese can eat it. You can't eat fresh flesh of an animal because it needs to be cooked. The moment you start cooking it, it becomes Rajasi. So sattvik is very fresh, like a fres anything which is fresh, the only animal meat you can eat fresh would be fish, freshly caught fish, which can be cut into a piece, like a salmon or something like that. Everything else would be rajasik because it is cooked. And anything which gets spoilt and rotten, which you don't want to eat, is tamasik. But you know, alcohol is made by fermenting and idli is made by fermenting, and all the fermented kimchi fermented.

Neha Lamba Grover: Mm-hmm.

Devdutt: So we have figured out, humans have figured out even how rotten food can be made tasty. Right? We

Neha Lamba Grover: Yeah.

Devdutt: so we have found curing of meats and these kinds of things which would otherwise be considered in a hot climate, you can't cure it, but a cold climate you can. So cold people in cold places you can have cured meat. So it has nothing to do with food. This is a Vaishnav practice because many of the Vaishnavas were Jains. In Jainism, it was ext you know, it was they Jains were very clear. This the purpose of Jainism were to fast unto death. It is not about so it is not just ahimsa, ahimsa, it is also a parigraha, don't accumulate wealth and asteya, don't steal. So if that is if you apply all these three, let's look at a proper Jain. He should not just eat vegetarian food. Asteya, he can't steal anything, which means he can't drink milk because milk belongs to the cow. How are you stealing a cow's milk? So you can't drink milk, you can't eat animal flesh, apparently, you can't even eat a plant because plant is also alive. So you have decided plants are not alive because you decided. Now,

Neha Lamba Grover: Mm-hmm.

Devdutt: and then comes Aparigraha. You can't accumulate wealth. So a rich Jain is not a Jain at all. He's against Jainism. So you can't say, you know, I'll follow these rules. It's a negotiation, trading negotiation. I will eat vegetarian food, but I will also eat truffles. I will not eat from anything under the ground because you know, under the ground people will die. But what about Haldi? Haldi comes from under the ground. Then you should not have Haldi. And salt contains all kinds of animals because salt comes from the sea. It has all dead bodies and all kinds of debris of everything. And truffles are caught by pigs. And they are very

Neha Lamba Grover: Mushroom, yeah, yes, yeah, yeah.

Devdutt: famous amongst the Jain community. So they love it. And they love

Neha Lamba Grover: Yeah, truffle. So

Devdutt: even peanuts, which is also coming from under the ground. So logic doesn't apply because it's really

Neha Lamba Grover: From one of yeah.

Devdutt: a caste identity marker. And it's a cast it. I'm a Jain, so I eat this kind of food. Wherever in the world you go, you there's a Jain kitchen, there's a Jain Way, which is lovely. But there's nothing ethical or moral about any food habit. No food habit makes you ethically or morally superior to anyone else, other than gluttony. Gluttony makes you ethically inferior. So all those Michelin star restaurants which have these exotic food items would be falling in the gluttony category. Because Simple food, sadhajivan, simple food. So you are eating exotic food, not spiritual.

Neha Lamba Grover: So saada food you've written somewhere that is what eventually evolved into shuddh food or pure food. And how did that? Yeah, yeah.

Devdutt: Yeah. Pure food. So it is basically so in Odisha, when you go in where I come from, when you say I want sadha khaana, it means vegetarian food.

Neha Lamba Grover: Yeah. Okay.

Devdutt: So across east, you just say saadha khaana is vegetarian food. Because sadhuka khana, sadha ota hai. it's a simple food. Simple food, monk's food. Because the monk would not eat something exotic. He will eat the simplest of food which is left over in the house. Meat will not normally be left over, right? You will keep a little rice left over, a little daal leftover, some vegetables will be left over. Because normally in a household, what is extra? You'll always have rice as extra. That's all that will be given

Neha Lamba Grover: Yeah, yeah.

Devdutt: to him. And daal will be given to him. And they ate leftover food. So we have food was very simple in India. They have now made it ex exotic. My problem was when I started looking at how temples were designed. Temples were designed on the basis of this is pure, this is impure, and I saw how caste was being reinforced through food. All of them. Whether it's a Jain temple, whether it's a Swaminarayan temple, whether it is a Balaji temple, all temples in North India, all temples abroad, they all have this barricade of vegetarianism, and that's how caste was established in India. That is why we'll never annihilate caste in our country.

Neha Lamba Grover: So, even among the Sikhs, and that's another religion, a more modern religion, but in the same geography, right? does not prescribe vegetarianism, and yet at their langers, which are open to anyone, any religion can come in, unlike a lot of say the Hindu temples that won't let other Hindus in and women in and all that, they serve vegetarian food. Wha why is that?

Devdutt: So there are two influences to this. One is we must understand the caste structure of Sikhism. Original Sikhism, the first 10 Gurus came from the Khatri communities. They were trading. Again, it's a trading community. So all the Nanakji, all of them were from Khatris. When the Mughals started tormenting them and it really became dark in the 16th, 17th century, they needed warriors to fight. So a lot of Jats joined them. And the Jats joined them. And there was this kind of a divide between the Khatris and the Jats. And in India, in order to rise up the caste ladder, sometimes have to be followed. So the Jats used to have a practice called Chadrachadhana, which is remarriage of widows. They said, we'll give that up. We'll give up remarriage of widows. We will know widows will not be allowed to remarry. So that shows that you are now pure. And then we will eat vegetarian food. Then Arya Samaj comes in in the 19th century and promotes this neo-Hinduism, which is and that becomes very popular in the Jat communities. So the Jat start identifying themselves that we are better than the same thing is happening with the Swami Narand community in Gujarat. Because remember, the Patidars are neither Ajputs, nor Jains, nor Vaishnavs, nor traditional, but they became very successful in K Africa. They became very Africa in Africa, they made a lot of money and they became very, very rich. And they created their own caste group, and the Swami Naran community comes from that caste group. And it's a caste, you know, nobody wants to use these words caste, but hello, it caste. Hinduism is caste. How can we escape caste in India? And these people, so in what happened is this purity is so deeply ingrained in our system that it enters even Sikhism and it becomes vegetarian. So you'd never find this in the original writings of Sikhism. Never, it's not there at all. It was like a Langar, a Dera. These all these Dera concepts comes from the Sufi Silsila, a place where people gather. You get whatever food you have, you put it in a pot, you eat it from the pot, you sit down, you sing, you dance, you pray, you discuss philosophy, the teacher tells you how to live your life. That's you have an ashram around it, and that's how these khanikhas and silsilas emerged. And that's exactly the Dhera concept in North India. They didn't have temples. There were no temples in Punjab, there were deras where a Guruji sat. And he would give food and everybody would eat whatever, everybody's welcome, everybody eats, and there's no caste rule. So it is a very different. That's why you find a lot of Sufi influence in Sikhism also, Bhakti influence in Sikhism also. But over time, Hinduism, because caste became a bad word, we started using this purification model. And Arya Samaj plays a very important role in this. Arya Samaj was founded by a Gujarati Brahmin. Dayanand Saraswati was a Gujarati Brahmin, and he Imagined Hinduism, a comp he created a new religion. All his translations of the Rig Veda are his own imaginary translation, nothing to do with the Rig Veda. And people will get offended if they say it. But I mean, you just do a Google search, do a learning management, just take the Rig Vedic verse and see what he writes in Satiparkash Bharati. There's no correlation. It's his own imaginary concepts that this is what it is, this is what it is. He created a religion which was very powerful in the 19th century because there's demand to create a religion was there in the 19th century. They create a religion.

Neha Lamba Grover: Mm-hmm.

Devdutt: All of our Hindus have to follow this religion. And then you suddenly had something like a hadith equivalent. That God has told me to do this. God has told me to do this. Krishna tells you to not give eggs to children. Sita is pure vegetarian. Ram did not kill deer. All this nonsense idea sound very much like a Muslim talking about hadith.

Neha Lamba Grover: So the UP government with the One District, One Cuisine Initiative also

Devdutt: Yeah, yeah.

Neha Lamba Grover: has negated the fact that UP has such a deep culinary tradition, which is embedded in eating meat and non-vegetarian food. And the timing of it was also, you know, about six months after the UN declared Lucknow, I think a culinary gastronomical city, and specific dishes were mentioned which were non vegetarian and this came out. So this I mean, how where do you see this initiative leading? I was gonna wipe out the Yeah, sorry?

Devdutt: See, nobody cares for the government in India. See, in the India, these laws of the government are not, nobody really listens to all of them. Who takes them seriously? Do really think people think politicians are serious and to be taken seriously? Nobody takes them seriously. They have no understanding of culture, they have no understanding of plurality. And this new Hindu Rashtra is trying to homogenize Hinduism. They hate, you know, they're homogenizing Hinduism in their imaginary way. So North India doesn't know what is South India. They have no understanding of the culture of South India. They have no understanding of East India. They have no understanding of West India. They genuinely have no understanding of geography. They're like completely uneducated people. But they have won the elections, and we have somehow been told that if you win elections, somehow you don't control Hinduism. Hinduism is not created by a Pope. We don't have a Jesus or a Muhammad telling us what to do our life. Which who tells Hindus how to live their lives? My caste follows my caste rules and my caste adapts, and my mother decides what the Gods will be worshipped in our house. And every family decides their own. We don't refer or we don't need permission of a guru. If a guru acts too smart, you just change the guru and get a new guru. A god you don't like, you change the gods. You say, I today I won't worship this god. Tomorrow I'll worship that god. You have we have a bouquet of gods and bouquet of gurus, and okay, you buy us, we'll do it privately in our house. Nobody's gonna stop me. So, this idea that they can decide what is Hinduism is is hubris. Hubris of a few celibate men who have never got married and have never, you know. I have always a problem, it's a personal opinion. I genuinely believe that a Guruji who is not married should not be trusted. Because, you know, I feel celibacy is unnatural and an extremely terrible thing. And in my experience, all celibate people are liars. So I keep away from celibate people, especially if they proclaim their celibacy with orange robes. I am terrified of them and I keep all my children away from them.

Neha Lamba Grover: Is it I mean celibacy also has become a bit of a virtue, isn't it? And how does it how does it impact I mean how does it become anti-feminist in a way? How does it encourage misogyny? you've I think written something about the connection between this emphasis on purity and the link with misogyny.

Devdutt: A, can you prove anyone is celibate? There is no mathematical test or a scientific test, right?

Neha Lamba Grover: Yeah, yeah. Or the rise of the hermit, for instance, and how yeah. Yeah. Yeah.

Devdutt: So imagine a man walks away. Imagine if someone tells you that your body is evil.

Neha Lamba Grover: Yeah.

Devdutt: Right? So Buddha walks away from his wife, and I'm surprised the whole world says, what a great journey to enlightenment. He's walked away from his wife and his children. And that has become a virtue. And we see this as a virtue. Gandhi decides to be a hermit without taking permission of his wife. So, you know, these kind of it's his patriarchy. Disguised as holiness. The rejection of the woman is considered to be holy. Now, if does that sound pro-feminine? Where a woman's body is considered dirty, evil, foul, impure, kept away. So a holy man is someone who doesn't look at women, who is raised without looking at women, who turns away from women. How would you feel? That's basically the first untouchable in society becomes the woman. I know Guruji's if you give them a girl child to hold, they'll drop the girl child saying that you have contaminated me.

Neha Lamba Grover: really? okay, that's interesting.

Devdutt: It's dark and disgusting and should be called out. And if we don't call it out, we start believing these crazy people are pure. So this is part of the purity hierarchy. Veg food is pure, semen inside your body is pure. I'm still trying to figure out how semen inside your body makes you pure. So all these, whether it's a Sadhguru or a Sri Shri Ravi Shankar, they don't have married, they don't have children, they never talk about sex. They make a virtue of celibacy and somehow retaining semen inside your body becomes special. Then those women will shave their heads and make themselves hideous because apparently you are not supposed to be temptation to anyone. you know, these are these stories of in Japan, there's a story of the Buddhist woman who wanted to be a nun, and the teacher says that, yo, you because you're a woman, you cannot be a nun because you're so beautiful, everybody won't have sex with you. So she goes in front of a hot she take goes to the kitchen, takes a walk. Puts oil in it, heats it, puts water on the hawk, on the boiling water. On the boiling oil, she puts water. So it crackles and it starts bouncing up and down the hot steam. And she puts a face in front of it. And she burns her face in order to be

Neha Lamba Grover: Mm-hmm.

Devdutt: spiritual. If this is not misogyny, what is?

Neha Lamba Grover: Yeah. No, absolutely. So I'm talking you said I'm talking about untouchables. Where does the Dalit diet fit into all this? Because I and and actually let me make it

Devdutt: So d how many people know the litquiszy?

Neha Lamba Grover: a little broader, Devdutt. The if we are emphasizing vegetarianism and a very small part of Hindus are actually vegetarian, they're pushing the agenda. Why why does it continue to happen? I mean, first you have eighty percent Hindus that don't eat that aren't pure pure vegetarian, and then you have Dalits who have a very different cuisine which has arisen out of compulsion and discrimination and some very, very you know, the hardships of their situation. How does that fit into this emphasis on vegetarianism?

Devdutt: See, most Indians don't know how many Hindus, you know, you make a pie chart and then you have to tell them how much percentage are the vegetarians. Right?

Neha Lamba Grover: Okay.

Devdutt: And full-time vegetarians, 24 by 7 vegetarians. That would be less than 5 or 10%. Less than 5%. Rest of it are time, like temporary. Once in a while they'll eat meat. So when they

Neha Lamba Grover: Yeah.

Devdutt: say, I am looking vegetarian, the 20% number comes, includes both these people. Indians can afford meat only once a week. So they will say, I

Neha Lamba Grover: Okay, yeah. Yeah.

Devdutt: am vegetarian, hai. Nobody eats meat every day. You can't afford it. It's just too expensive. So people

Neha Lamba Grover: Yeah, yeah. Yeah.

Devdutt: don't realize, and and in states like Gujarat, and you're afraid that if somebody's asking you this question, are you veg or non-veg, that you tomorrow the police will come and raid your house? So you lie. So this entire thing that 20% of Hindus are vegetarian itself is a flawed number. You know, it's like the GDP

Neha Lamba Grover: Okay.

Devdutt: of India, which just keeps changing every day. So you you have less than 5-10% people who eat meat and who

Neha Lamba Grover: Hmm.

Devdutt: are pure vegetarians.

Neha Lamba Grover: Yeah.

Devdutt: But they are in dominant positions of power, mostly of Brahmins and Banias. Mostly Brahmins and Banias, and the Arya Samaj has made even the Sikhs vegetarian. So the Sikhs now are vegetarian, the Brahmins are vegetarian, and the Baniyas are vegetarian, and they control, as I said, they control the media, they control the publishing houses, they control all mediums of communication. So you get an illusion. You get this illusion of control. It's exactly what the Jewish lobby is accused of in America. It's exactly what the people accuse the Jewish lobby. They control everything and therefore they can shape the Discourse, and that's what happens. So we really don't know what the rest of India eats. Like I grew up in Bombay assuming that all veget South Indians were vegetarians because all my neighbors were South Indians and they all ate vegetarians. Then I discovered they were one community who came from the Coimbatore region, Palgat region. Because when I went to South India, I realized they eat more meat than anybody else on the planet.

Neha Lamba Grover: They do, yeah.

Devdutt: So I it was the biggest shock to me. I had no understanding because in Bombay we were always, and even Bollywood ka, if you see the madrasi, it's a vegetarian food. But when

Neha Lamba Grover: Yeah.

Devdutt: you go to South India, you realize there's a very different madrasi. This whole South Indian, the the you know, Kanadigas eat a lot of meat, the Punjabi, the Telugus eat a lot of meat, the Tulus eat a lot of meat, the you know, Kerala, Kerala is you know 30% Hindu, 30% Muslim, 30% Christian. So they are all eating beef, they eat. You know, they eat rabbit meat, they eat all kinds of meat. I mean, the the best meat is there in s South India. So the South Indian, the East India you go to everybody eats meat. And then you have only this North Indian Haryana, Punjab, Rajasthan Belt, which is on the border of Pakistan. And this whole idea that Muslims are veget non-vegetarian, therefore Hindus are vegetarians. Easy way of dividing. And these kinds of concepts can so we don't really don't like most Indians don't even know what Their neighbors eat, like which are the how many communities there are? Like

Neha Lamba Grover: That is true.

Devdutt: OBCs, how what do OBCs eat? What do SCs eat? What do ST eat? What do Bhils eat? What do Gonds eat? We don't know. There are so many diets in our country. Our parliament in our country. I keep asking the president of India is a tribal. What does she cook in her kitchen? Does anybody know the president of India? The previous president was a scheduled caste person. What did he cook in his kitchen? Do we know his food history of his family? We don't know. We just assume he's vegetarian because that's what the RSS told them to be, because they were the good members of the party. And then they will be taught. so there is this kind of erasing. What we accuse the Europeans of doing to India, that they erased Indian civilization, is exactly what the Brahmin Banyaya lobby is doing to all these communities. The OBC diets have been wiped out, the SC diets are being wiped out, the ST diets are being wiped out. It won't work, of course. India is too vast and very complicated. It doesn't work. All these people are trying to change Hinduism. Hindu Rashtra became a vegetarian Rashtra. And that is where I got alarmed. I realized that the game was nothing to do with Hinduism. It has everything to do with this vegetarian lobby trying to seize control of a religion. It's like an internal coup. It didn't work.

Neha Lamba Grover: So Devdutt how if if vegetarianism is being promoted in the name of religion, how do they justify the goddess worship strain of Hinduism where the you know the god the Ma Kali and Durga actually demand or require sacrifice of goat and blood and meat and actually goddesses everywhere in their various forms all over India?

Devdutt: So in the Punjab area, the goddess is vegetarian. So the Punjab area, the goddess is vegetarian and Rajputs today are terrified of giving all the Rajputs have lost their power and they are so dependent on the government that they are terrified of doing animal sacrifice because you lose elections and you will not get the election electoral tickets. The Marathas are terrified of talking about non-veg. They like if you ask people, was Shivaji a vegetarian or non-vegetarian? We really don't have they will say, No, no, no, he's vegetarian because he's a great man. Great men have to be vegetarian. Chanakya was vegetarian. Everybody Ashoka was no the the neo-Buddhists who are Dalits. Are also becoming vegetarian because they believe because this belief that vegetarian is pure is deeply end embedded. So even now the goddess has to become vegetarian. So now Durga Puja Pandals they are banning, they'll soon ban it and yeah, yeah, yeah. They'll ban it. And only South India will, you know, they will beat you up if you try to act too smart. South Indians are, you know, they will not listen to the the North Indians.

Neha Lamba Grover: And interestingly enough, I'm you know, in the West though, or at least in New York, I I think I'm I shouldn't use the word West, it's too broad. because the relationship that India has with the UK means the UK has been very familiar with Indian food. Last night I I went to a British chop house in New York, it was all Indian food. And you know, it was palak paneer and things like that. But it was so you know, they were owning that relationship that they have with food. But what I wanted to say was that in New York the vision of pan-Indian food is suddenly crumbling. While we are talking about homogenizing the Indian identity in India through food, in New York, I'm seeing a reverse trend. those Lexington curry houses, which slap, you know, which had a standard menu with these dishes, have very different stories of how they got onto that menu. Because, you know,

Devdutt: Yeah.

Neha Lamba Grover: Vindalu with that butter chicken and the biryani and all, they don't go together. Okay, and then South Indian Udipis are vegetarian dosas. Even I have discovered more about South Indian food and other regional foods in New York because of this new set of restaurants that are bursting out with regional identity. You know, there's Bengali food. Semma is a Michelin star, one of the rare Indian Michelin star restaurants

Devdutt: Yeah.

Neha Lamba Grover: that has it's just South Indian and it's all meat. so I think there is and you're right, there is this urge to there's a reverse urge. So I don't think this vegetarian push will push will work. because I think

Devdutt: See, initially what happened is all these India was seen as a land of the exotic people. And

Neha Lamba Grover: Yeah.

Devdutt: we hope we also people like Vivekananda promoted this idea. This even Yoganand and all this Autobiography of a Yogi. If you read their book, We in India, they talk about India as some exotic magical place, you know, and this is what emerged basically that we were these exotic people. And all these Gurujis mostly came from vegetarian backgrounds. Many of them, Pattabi, and all those yoga teachers came from vegetarian. And somehow vegetarian became again purity was equated with spirituality, was equated with vegetarian. And this is the kind of no but what has happened today is you know, first the when the software boom happened came from Telugu people, and the Telugu people were not vegetarians. Most of them who traveled were from Reddis, they were Kamas, they were all kinds food habits. They came in, the new habits came in. The Punjabis who had migrated were anywhere Arya Samaj influence. So they were anywhere trying to be purification. This whole lungers being purified, purified, purified. They wanted to, you know, there was all these games being played. But now what has happened is there are so many diaspora and in Hindus were never a single group, Indians were never a single group. We are caste groups, linguistic groups at best. Linguistic groups, but within linguistic groups, like a Marathi Koli food, even in today in Maharashtra, when there's Ganpati Puja, the Ganpati is given vegetarian food, but the goddess Gauri is given fish. And she is given fish in the same house. So the f fish will be given and they'll keep a screen between the mother and son. Because the mother should shouldn't you know the son should not get offended by the mother's son because apparently non-wedge food is offensive to the son. And there is a Bengali proverb that, you know, why does

Neha Lamba Grover: Mm-hmm.

Devdutt: the Bengali the goddess kill the buffalo? She says, you know, I'm going to my because I don't know whether my sons will take care of me because my son is vegetarian. So I want to eat good food. So she cuts a buffalo and she makes her food for herself. She's saying Because he's an elephant. So she takes care of her. Yeah, so he's a vegetarian. So

Neha Lamba Grover: Yeah. that's why it's vegetarian because the elephant connection. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Yeah.

Devdutt: he's saying, so she is very clear that she has to take care of herself. Her son won't take care of her. So you know these folk tales are there like this, which exist. So, what has happened is the different communities in America now this identity politics has become globally very important. And now people are asking, who am I? So you're not in Indian anymore because you've given up your passport.

Neha Lamba Grover: Mm-hmm. Yeah.

Devdutt: Then you're asking, what is a Hindu? Then what is a Hindu? Why should I follow a Jain cuisine? Why does this you know very strangely Hindu cuisine and Jain cuisine seem to be aligned with each other? And then you realize, hey, wait a minute, I'm a Maharashtan from a Kohli family. I'm a Maharashtran. Like now, Dipke has become very big, right? Now Dipke is Identified himself as an Ambedkarite. And then immediately people got a little alarmed. But what does he eat in his house? What is his food? What does Saurabh das eat in his house? You know, so I don't think a BJP member can openly say that he eats non-vegetarian because he'll be kicked out of the party. Or he will not get the, you know, be silently sidelined. So they are forced. I know that somebody's writing a book on non-vegetarian food in India. And she approached people who we know eat non-vegetarian food and hold major positions of power currently in the government. They all said no, our careers will be ruined. So this kind of coercion is happening, you know. The coercion, ki haram, halal, agar, haram, kar, satvikhana. Satvikhana has become equal to the equ equal to halal food. Because Muslims have halal, we have sattvik. They have haram, so we have tamasik. Now, where does Rajasikh fit in? We don't know. So we are confused because our ancestors gave us three. And you know, when you ask them what is the source of these ideas, they don't know. This is not coming. They're competing with Muslims, right? Most of these Vegetarian lobbies competing with the Muslim lobby. And that's the problem. They were first competing with the British in the colonial past, then they started competing with the Muslims. And right now they're still in competition. And then China has suddenly appeared out of the blue. And I keep saying Chinese eat everything. And they're much smarter than you. And they're five times richer than you. And then they get very upset. He's saying up SAQ, they get very upset. But then unfortunately.

Neha Lamba Grover: Why did the Chinese not Chinese have not felt the need to either explain their identity through defining their way of life as a religion or you know.

Devdutt: Well, the the Han Chinese is very clearly identity, and the Han

Neha Lamba Grover: Yeah. Yeah.

Devdutt: Chinese, that is why they have a problem with Tibet, because Tibet tries to be non-Han by its Buddhist roots. And Uyghirs

Neha Lamba Grover: Mm.

Devdutt: are non-Han by their Muslim roots. This is why China has a problem with both Tibet and Uyghurs, because they have an identity which is outside the Han identity. Same

Neha Lamba Grover: Mm-hmm. Got it.

Devdutt: is with Japan. Remember, Japan, Korea, Chinese, the both all these three cultures have always been xenophobic. They have never made these walls outside their kingdoms and have not let outside influences enter their country. They've always been very clear. That's why the church was not allowed to enter Japan for the longest time. They were not allowed to enter the city. In China, they could breach the Chinese, they were not giving them access to the markets. The Koreans were not giving them access to the markets. The Thai did not give them access to the markets. So the entire Eastern world is based on this concept of what is called the Great Wall. or what's called the Hermit Kingdom, which Hermit Kingdom is basically this wall, the concept of wall. So Chinese have these cities with beautiful walls. Today they have the Chinese firewall. So the Great Wall of China has become the firewall.

Neha Lamba Grover: Mm-hmm. So No Forks Given is the name that I gave to this podcast because I was sort of alluding to the fact that, you know, we eat with our hands, or cultures that eat with the hands, So I have to ask you a question about the mudras, the Indian mudras and that are recommended in terms of You know, whether you're serving the food to yourself or to others, and there are different ways in which we use our fingers and hands. Can you talk a little bit about that? Because there is a whole ritual around it. Yeah.

Devdutt: Yeah. So you know the world can be divided culturally into cutlery cultures, chopstick cultures, and finger cultures. So

Neha Lamba Grover: Yeah.

Devdutt: cutlery cultures are the western world and then the chopstick cultures are the eastern world, and Indians are the fingers. Now

Neha Lamba Grover: Yeah.

Devdutt: the fingers is also used in Arab countries and Persian countries, but the the kind of ritual rules which are there in India are not found in other places. First of all, you have to eat with the right hand, you cannot touch use the left hand at all. Left hand is for ablutions, right hand is for eating. So there's very clear division between the pure hand and the impure hand.

Neha Lamba Grover: Yeah.

Devdutt: And the pure hand when you're eating, depending on which part of India you're coming from, some will only use the fingers, some will also use the palm of the hand. The southern country cities will use the palm of the hand also. So other the North Indian because they have roties, they can afford only to take the dips of the but if you eat with rice, you can make a ball out of the rice, you can make a ball and throw the ball into your mouth. So these are all kinds of different ways of eating. And basically the whole idea is that you have to feel the temperature of the food before you put it on your tongue. Otherwise, in a cutlery, you'll immediately feel the press you can burn your tongue. You'll never burn your tongue if you're eating with your hand. Because your fingers will burn first. So you'll never put it in your mouth if it is burning. You'll like wait, right? The thing is with spices, with the introduction of spices, we don't know if it's spicy. You can put it in your mouth and burn your mouth. But originally, these most of the spices, like chilies, came to India only in the Colombian exchange. It didn't exist

Neha Lamba Grover: Yeah, yeah.

Devdutt: for three, four hundred years ago. Pepper was the only spice, but that was only in South India, it was never there in North India. So Indian food was never really spicy, what we call curry food. Right? We

Neha Lamba Grover: Hmm. Yeah.

Devdutt: were so the food in India would have been very different, fried food mostly. Haldi was a very important part. So the thing is about how do you eat is you know the yagyas were very simple. You when you offer it to the gods you offer it with the right hand and through the it has to flow over your fingers to the gods. So you always give the gods food or flowing over your fingers away from your body towards the gods.

Neha Lamba Grover: W away from your body. Yeah.

Devdutt: Right? Then the right hand when you're feeding it you you always take the ladle of the food and you serve it towards your heart to serve food to people. So that's what you do because your family is always on your Right side. So it's sitting, I mean, sorry, you sit on the left side. So you keep turning it. So your food turns this way. So you're towards your heart. And then you serve away from the heart. This is for dead people. So ancestors. So this is called the for the Pitras, ancestors. So if I serve you food this way, people say, Are you disrespectful? You don't food serve this way. Always serve it towards your body, not away from your body. But ghosts are ancestors. You respect them, but you don't want them in your life. So you feed

Neha Lamba Grover: Mm-hmm.

Devdutt: them, but you keep them away. Okay, very clearly telling them, you know, you're not welcome. We respect you, but you're not welcome into the house. And the an animals are to be fed with your the you know the the mound in your feet this palm of your hand, center

Neha Lamba Grover: Okay, the the center, but okay.

Devdutt: of the hand, this is where you give the animals, the livestock you give. So you can say that this is given to the plants. So you worship the plants because food comes from the plants. You worship animals, you feed them from here. You have ancestors, your you know, those who remember your past, your lineage, your family members, you serve like this, your guests, your friends, whoever comes to your house, and yourself you serve like this. You eat yourself like this. So your every part So it is really you you don't eat alone, you eat with everybody around you. So that's the thali. You have the thali where everybody's eating, which is the you know, so everybody has to be fed. That is very important. In a world where everybody is fed, there is no fighting. There's nobody's Hangry. Nobody's

Neha Lamba Grover: Hm.

Devdutt: Hangry, so there is nobody's angry, and so nobody's fighting. So feed everybody. So that's the Hindu.

Neha Lamba Grover: Everybody's well fed and you feel secure.

Devdutt: Nobody is going to fight. You know, there's a very famous story

Neha Lamba Grover: Yeah. So

Devdutt: of folk tale of Sita that when she was in Lanka,

Neha Lamba Grover: Hmm.

Devdutt: she would sit there, she was bored, she didn't know to do. So she would smell the food which was coming, the smell of the food which came from all the kitchens of Lanka, and she would give advice that's And the people started following instructions, the food became so tasty that men started eating more and more food and they would go to sleep and they wouldn't want to fight wars. So Ravan got very angry and he said, my god, this woman can control my city just by sitting in the Ashoka Vatika. And he Nobody, no more food until we go to war.

Neha Lamba Grover: That that's a very interesting story. And Ram and Sita you've said ate meat too, right? Although deer hunting wasn't just for sport or to protect themselves,

Devdutt: Yeah, yeah, she ate everything. She was a vanakanya, she was a forest woman.

Neha Lamba Grover: but over time. Yeah.

Devdutt: Yeah, yeah, they ate everything. This nonsense which is being spread by foolish people should not be endorsed. I told you, celibacy makes you mad, and vegetarian food gives you vitamin B12 deficiency. This is my personal belief. Therefore, I believe that there is some psychological problem.

Neha Lamba Grover: So one last question, it takes us back to where we started. And it's I think a perfect time since you talked about Sita and her cooking. Back to the woman and the kitchen. as the modern lifestyles are evolving, the kitchen is also changing. I remember in Rajasthan when I would I mean, I'm the eldest greatgrandchild among many, many, many. So I remember taking my shoes off and going into the kitchen and sitting where the elders were already there and there was chula and things like that. but that has all changed. How is it going to impact how we pass on culture or how is it going to impact other things? Any any other impact that you see in the way we are engaging around the kitchen and the home?

Devdutt: So hierarchy is a sign of the ego. Right? So any form of hierarchy, elder hierarchy, gender hierarchy, age hierarchy, race hierarchy, caste hierarchy, these are all signs of the ego. So that's not healthy at all. So I I think we will every period of time we redefine religion by looking at the core values. And the core values is eat and feed others. That's the core value that if that remains, all is well with the world. Your children learn how to cook food and feed people. You know, in Scandinavian countries, they don't give you food if you go to their houses. Now that's not an Indian value. I don't know if you

Neha Lamba Grover: Yeah.

Devdutt: saw the very famous Twitter thing where it came out and the whole world pounced on them because everybody was shocked. Because Arab countries, African countries, all the countries in the world have this tradition of feeding people who come to their house. So

Neha Lamba Grover: Yeah. Yeah.

Devdutt: barkat, barkat means fortune. You should be rich enough. And you know, I know people, the rich people's houses where they don't feed their servants. I know Bzillionaires who don't feed their servants. So this is poverty of the mind. I think if your children learn to have a full kitchen and always feed people, they'll be happy people and they'll spread happiness around them. And if you don't have that life skill, you're going to create a miserable, miserable world.

Neha Lamba Grover: Thank you so much, Devdutt, for you know, I can go on talking forever, It's really, really been fascinating. And I hope that we'll continue this conversation

Devdutt: Sure. Thank you so much.

Neha Lamba Grover: Thank you.