After The Guardian, BBC (British Broadcasting Corporation) another flagbearer of hypocritical Western media tried to cry about Muslim victimhood and criticise the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) ruled Uttar Pradesh and Uttarakhand for introducing strict punishment to punish contamination of food through various means including spitting.
The BBC and Western media in general appear to have taken issue with the regulation that requires restaurant owners, managers and employees of all religions including Hindus, Sikhs, Jains, and others to display their real names so that customers know who they are buying their food items from. They want Indians, especially Hindus, to forgo personal hygiene and health care at the altar of secularism.
The BBC attacked the saffron party for trying to ensure that the food served to customers is at least free of spit and other such contaminants in an article titled, “India states’ plans to punish spitting in food spark controversy,” published on 28th October. It was written by Cherylann Mollan and read, “This month, two states ruled by India’s governing Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) announced plans to impose hefty fines and imprisonment for contaminating food with spit, urine and dirt. The northern state of Uttarakhand will fine offenders up to 100,000 ($1,190, £920) rupees while neighbouring Uttar Pradesh is set to introduce stringent laws to address the issue.”
The piece added, “The government directives followed the circulation of unverified videos on social media showing vendors spitting on food at local stalls and restaurants – and one video depicting a house-help mixing urine into the food she was preparing. While the videos sparked outrage among users, with many expressing concern about food safety in these states, some of the videos also became the subject of blame campaigns targeting Muslims, which were later debunked by fact-checking websites. They pointed out that many on social media had alleged that the woman adding urine to food was Muslim, but police later identified her as a Hindu.”
It should come as no surprise that the BBC used ‘fact-check’ of Islamic fanatic Mohammed Zubair’s dubious Alt News to assert that Muslims are innocent and Hindus are the ones who pollute the food, then place blame on the former while citing the case of a maid who peed into dough meant for making rotis for her employers. BBC singled out one case to invalidate all the real instances of spitting and urinating in food and drinks prepared by Muslims to undermine all the credible complaints, in a standard liberal-Islamist move to mislead others.
“Officials say strict laws are necessary and are aimed at deterring people from indulging in unhygienic practices around food, but opposition leaders and legal experts have questioned the efficacy of these laws and allege that they could also be misused to vilify a specific community. The Indian Express newspaper criticised the ordinances proposed by Uttar Pradesh state, saying that they ‘act as a communal (sectarian) dog whistle that preys on the majority’s notions of purity and pollution and targets an already insecure minority’,” the article linked the government directive to prejudice and demonization of a group to further denigrate its true objective of providing consumers with safe and hygienic food.
BBC simply repeated rhetoric from the opposition and liberal elements of Indian media. Nevertheless, like them, it provided no data or proof to support its claims. The article then elaborated on how food safety is a critical and significant subject in India. “Food and food habits are sensitive subjects in culturally diverse India as they are deeply intertwined with religion and the country’s hierarchical caste system. Norms and taboos around food sometimes lead to clashes between communities, sparking feelings of distrust. Consequently, the notion of ‘food safety’ has also become entangled with religion, which is sometimes used to ascribe motive to alleged incidents of contamination.”
Notably, the Uttar Pradesh government’s decision was prompted by numerous incidents of altercations between devotees and Muslim vendors who were discovered to be polluting the food that the former were being served. The decision was taken to maintain both communal harmony in the state and respect the religious sentiments of the Hindu pilgrims.
The piece then mentioned, “Food safety is also a major concern in India, with the Food Safety and Standards Authority (FSSAI) estimating that unsafe food causes around 600 million infections and 400,000 deaths annually. Experts cite various reasons for poor food safety in India, including inadequate enforcement of food safety laws and a lack of awareness. Cramped kitchens, dirty utensils, contaminated water, and improper transport and storage practices further compromise food safety. So, when videos of vendors spitting on food came out, people were shocked and outraged. Soon after, Uttarakhand announced hefty fines on offenders and made it mandatory for police to verify hotel staff and for CCTVs to be installed in the kitchen.”
“In Uttar Pradesh, Chief Minister Yogi Adityanath said to stop such incidents, police should verify every employee. The state also plans to make it mandatory for food centres to display the names of their owners, for cooks and waiters to wear masks and gloves and for CCTVs to be installed in hotels and restaurants. According to reports, Adityanath is planning to bring in two ordinances that will penalise spitting in food with imprisonment for up to 10 years,” it shed light on the legislation that the two governments had put in place to guarantee food safety.
It’s interesting to note that the article’s attempt to paint the law negatively actually highlighted the significance of food safety, and pointed out that the government’s decision was not unexpected, rather, it followed several such occurrences that sparked public outcry. Additionally, it unintentionally underlined how the government is trying to prevent any anti-social or illegal elements and more importantly avoid any unfortunate events by asking for identification proof to verify an individual’s true identity.
It also brought out that the Supreme Court of India forbade the implementation of the order and stated, “In July, India’s Supreme Court had stayed directives issued by the Uttarakhand and Uttar Pradesh governments asking people running food stalls along the route of Kanwar yatra – an annual Hindu pilgrimage – to prominently display the names and other identity details of their owners. Petitioners told the top court that the directives unfairly targeted Muslims and would negatively impact their businesses.”
BBC tried to defend the perpetrators but exposed its agenda
The article also included two recent cases involving spitting by members of the Muslim community. “On Wednesday, police in the state’s Barakanki town arrested restaurant owner Mohammad Irshad for allegedly spitting on a roti (flat bread) while preparing it. Mr Irshad was charged with disturbing peace and religious harmony, the Hindustan Times newspaper reported. Earlier this month, police in Mussoorie, Uttarakhand, arrested two men – Naushad Ali and Hasan Ali – for allegedly spitting in a saucepan while making tea, and accused them of causing public outrage and jeopardising health, reported The Hindu.”
Amusingly, the instances were stated to allege that Muslims are now ‘under attack’ only because they were caught spitting. “The videos of the men spitting, which found their way onto social media days before they were arrested, were given a religious spin after many Hindu nationalist accounts began calling them incidents of ‘thook-jihad’ or ‘spit-jihad.’ The term is a spin on ‘love-jihad‘ which has been coined by radical Hindu groups, who use it to accuse Muslim men of converting Hindu women by marriage. By extension, ‘thook-jihad’ accuses Muslims of trying to defile Hindus by spitting in their food.”
First of all, there is a long list of similar incidents of Muslims spitting or urinating in food meant for others to label the aforementioned occurrences as isolated. The outrage transpired only after many such incidents were recorded not only in the two states but all over India. Just last month, at a Noida dhaba, a man by the name of Chand was observed spitting on the rotis that were being prepared for the customers. Spit is even utilized as a cosmetic component as was demonstrated when Muhammad Zaid was witnessed spitting on his client Pandit Ashish Kumar’s face at his salon, in June. Notably, when the instance is not of spitting then it is of disrespecting the religious feelings of Hindus through other ways as illustrated by Tanver who sold chicken biryani to devotees returning from Haridwar after claiming it was vegetarian.
The “radical Hindu groups” do not ask the members of the Muslim community to pollute the food and drinks just like they never told them to hide their identities to trap, torture and forcefully convert Hindu girls to Islam which often leads to a brutal end of the victim’s life. The term ‘thook-jihad’ or ‘love jihad’ came into existence after these cases surfaced in various parts of India over the past many years. BBC purposefully attempted to cast doubt on these tragedies by implying that they were collective figments of a notorious Hindu imagination without any roots in reality, to deny extremely serious and real events that continue to affect thousands of lives.
“This is not the first time that the Muslim community has become the target of spitting accusations. During the COVID-19 pandemic, a series of fake videos showing Muslims spitting, sneezing or licking objects to infect people with the virus went viral on social media. The videos heightened religious polarisation, with Hindu hardline accounts posting anti-Muslim rhetoric,” the article then makes an effort to refute the documented cases of Muslims, particularly those in the Tablighi Jamat, who were a major contributor to the pandemic’s spread. They not only violated the strict measures put in place but also fled and hid in different parts of the country. They even harassed hospital staff where they were admitted. Many Muslims also publicly boasted that Corona is from Allah, and even called it “Allah’s NRC” (National Register of Citizens).
The piece then added a statement from a Uttarakhand government officer and mentioned “But Manish Sayana, a food safety officer in Uttarakhand, says the government’s orders are solely aimed at making food safe for consumption. He told the BBC that the food safety officers and the police have started conducting surprise checks at eateries and that they ‘urge people to wear masks and gloves and install CCTVs’ wherever they go for checks.”
“Legal expert and journalist V Venkatesan says there is a need for new ordinances and laws around food safety to be properly debated on the assembly floor,” the piece stated and quoted him, “According to me, the existing laws (under the Food Safety and Standards Act, 2006) are sufficient to take care of any offences connected to food safety. So, one needs to ask why the a need for these new laws and directives. Governments seem to think that laws prescribing harsh punishments will deter people from committing crimes, but research has shown that it is the proper implementation of laws that deter people from committing crimes. So, have the existing laws not been properly implemented in these states yet?”
BBC’s hate campaign against Hindus and India
BBC is infamous for its anti-India coverage and despise of the Hindu community. The media house that cries ‘minorities under attack in India’ at the drop of a hat as shown by the aforementioned article tried to whitewash the deliberate assault of minorities especially Hindus at the hands of Islamists in Bangladesh. It also engaged in propaganda against the Ram Mandir and even justified its outrageously biased coverage of the issue. The media house which is also full of hatred against Prime Minister Narendra Modi and “Hindutva” which is demonstrated by their biased reporting didn’t shy away from spewing lies about the anti-Hindu Leicester either.
Conclusion
Notably, the BBC attempted to indicate as though the rule only applied to Muslims, when in reality, it applied to all communities. The report also failed to address the reasons why the Muslims do not wish to operate their eateries under their true names. Are they concealing something? If Muslims can prioritize halal food and other products in the name of basic freedom and rights, why aren’t Hindus granted the same privilege and allowed to choose where they purchase their food? Why should they be subjected to deceit and deception to maintain ‘secularism’ in the nation? Why must Hindus alone bear the burden of secularism?
The media houses from the Western countries that follow strict food safety standards don’t want the two states to maintain the same as it would interfere with their anti-India agenda and their perpetual portrayal of the country’s second-largest community as a vulnerable minority regardless of the ground reality. Or in their efforts to defend their favourite community are the Western media exposing them by implying that they will face legal action because they are frequently caught engaging in such conduct? More significantly, is the author prepared to taste food from such an eatery and jeopardize her well-being and hygiene to promote ‘secularism,’ which she wants the Hindu community to do?
