Bengal BJP chief rejects Bageshwar Baba’s call to avoid meat: ‘No one can tell Bengalis what to eat’

West Bengal BJP president Samik Bhattacharya has rejected a call by preacher Dhirendra Shastri, popularly known as Bageshwar Baba, for Bengalis to avoid non-vegetarian food during Durga Puja.

“Nobody can tell the people of West Bengal what they should eat,” Bhattacharya said, according to PTI. He added that Bengalis would continue to “eat ‘luchi’ on Ashtami and goat meat on Navami.”

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Nobody can tell the people of West Bengal what they should eat.

Shastri had described people who ate non-vegetarian food during the festive season as “hypocrites” and urged them to abandon the practice. Bhattacharya said no one could dictate Bengal’s eating habits, asking, “Can Bengalis not eat fish and meat?” He also pointed to the offering of goat meat to Goddess Kali.

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Bengalis will eat what they have been eating. Can Bengalis not eat fish and meat? Swami Vivekananda has said it. Who is above him?

Bhattacharya said he respected Shastri as a religious figure, but his personal views could not be imposed on the people of Bengal. Saints or doctors could advise people to become vegetarian, he said, but “nobody coming from outside can sit in Bengal and decide who will eat what and who will wear what.”

Shastri made the appeal during a recent visit to West Bengal, where he held religious programmes across the state under the BJP government. The BJP has sought to distance itself from his comments and from any prescription that could be seen as regulating the state’s eating habits. Bhattacharya also said a controversial government advertisement depicting Goddess Durga may have contained a technical or printing error by the advertising agency, and advised against turning it into a political controversy.

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Nobody coming from outside can sit in Bengal and decide who will eat what and who will wear what.