Society

Aloo Weds Palak

It’s culinary monogamy. India ponders a one-dish law at marriages.

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Aloo Weds Palak
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One for the Menu...

  • In Pakistan, only one main dish can be served at weddings. Roti, rice, salad, hot and cold drinks are not counted. Rs 5 lakh fine and one year in jail for violators.
  • There is an Assam Guest Control Order, 1973, which allows only 25 people at parties and a maximum of hundred guests at weddings and funerals. Not many in Assam have ever heard of this law.
  • The NAC is looking at the Pakistan model of one-dish meal at weddings. But questions arise: Can there be one vegetarian and one non-vegetarian dish? Are sweets counted as a dish? What about roti or rice? Also, what will the penalty be?
  • How will the rule be implemented? Will there be food inspectors? The Assam rule gives a police officer 'above the rank of a sub-inspector' power to enter, search and seize if he has reason to believe the rule is not being followed.
  • The rationale behind the proposal is clear. India is 67th in a ranking of 122 most malnourished countries. 40 million people go hungry every day. But will a rule like this help, when the government itself fails to distribute surplus foodgrain to the poor?

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It's an old, musty wedding invitation from 1945, uploaded onto the internet. After announcing the time, date and venue of the happy occasion, it carries a curious instruction, right at the bottom: “Please send your rations in advance.” For Indian couples throwing a wedding feast in those pre-Independence, World War II years, that was probably the only way to feed guests.

Since then, we’ve never really had a law against feeding people. But we’ve come close, though. Chef Rajdeep Kapoor, with ITC Maratha, Mumbai, was just a kid during Sanjay Gandhi’s time. “I was in Delhi then, and weddings in the capital were allowed to have only one potato dish,” he remembers. So guests were served potato croquets with a little ketchup to liven things up. “Can you even imagine that today?” he asks.

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Well, yes, if Union food & consumer affairs minister K.V. Thomas has his way. Wedding invitations could soon have a line stating, “According to government orders, guests will be served only one dish.” He was looking into the National Advisory Committee’s suggestion of curbing food wastage at weddings and big social events. One of the ideas was the one-dish rule at weddings, like Pakistan has (see box). “Food wastage in marriages and other social functions should be brought down. Even on flights, almost 50 per cent of the food served is wasted. To start off, we plan to start an awareness campaign. Later, if needed, a legislation will be brought in,” he told Outlook.

It’s easy to see the sentiment behind such a rule. Having heaps of leftovers after a wedding certainly amounts to insensitivity in a country that is 67th on the list of 122 poorest countries. Forty million people go hungry every day. But how will it be implemented? “I think it’s a model concept for these modern times of overconsumption. But how can it ever be implemented in a free country like ours? You can’t force people to have only two kids, so how do you expect them to serve one dish at weddings?” asks actress Gul Panag, who got married last month. “What can be on a one-dish menu? A biriyani? Then you need veg and non-veg biriyanis. That’s two dishes already. And then, does the raita count as a dish?” asks Kapoor.

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A kitchen-factory at an Indian wedding. (Photograph by P. Anil Kumar)

Meher Sarid, a Delhi-based wedding planner who handles countless high-profile weddings in a year, also finds the scheme “impossible to implement”: at most weddings, nearly 30 per cent of the expenditure is on food. “In our culture, it’s rude to serve a guest only one dish. Even when you eat at home, you have more than one dish. So how in the world can you expect to serve only one dish at a wedding in this day and age? It’s simply ridiculous,” she says. More so, since menus, especially for weddings in big business families, can run into five pages. Mumbai-based wedding planner Gurleen Puri says she has catered to weddings where over 200 dishes were served. Vanaja Rao, of Quick Marriages, Hyderabad, says she does think serving 15 types of biriyani or 20 types of sweets at weddings is pointless. “But a one-dish rule will never work. Indians save up for the weddings of their children for years and like to show society they did not skimp on the expenses.”

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A rule like this also could take the sizzle out of the catering industry, say insiders. Ram Babu Sharma, vice-president of the Madhya Pradesh Tent & Caterers Association, who has been in the business for 30 years, agrees that restrictions should be limited to high-class, lavish marriages where 200 to 250 dishes are served. “Around 3 crore people are employed in the catering industry in our country. If the government makes any such law, many of these people will become jobless. It will affect our economy,” he says. Agrees Sanjay Vazirani of Mumbai’s Food Links, whose main business revolves around weddings, “A law like this will put us out of business.”

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The other question is of policing, should such a regulation come into force. In Assam, there is a Guest Control Order of 1973 that few residents have heard of. It says there can’t be more than 25 guests at ordinary parties (including the host and hostess) and not more than 100 at weddings and funerals. Even some top cops in Guwahati are not aware of this order.

Rajkumar Vatkar, DCP (operations) and spokesperson of Mumbai Police, is sceptical about the success of enforcing a one-dish law in a country where eating and weddings go together. “Do we catch criminals or look at who is serving what dish at weddings? It is practically impossible to keep track of this,” he says. He is quick to add that he would “strongly recommend” that, should a rule like this come into effect, the task of policing be given to municipal corporations or health departments.

There is also a debate over what exactly a move like this will achieve. If individuals start serving only one dish at weddings, will it help feed the hungry? Isn’t food security for the people the state’s responsibility? Last year, the foodgrain rotting in just Punjab and Haryana could have fed over a crore people, but the government was unable to channel it through the public distribution mechanism. “It’s time wastage is controlled. Not just in weddings and other social functions, but also in government, through better food storage mechanisms. We are working on it. I don’t want to blame other people when my own house is not in order,” Thomas concedes. Even NAC member Harsh Mander says, “In a country of glaring inequalities, it is both insensitive and unethical to waste food. But I’m not sure if government control is the way out. There has to be a larger campaign.” The food business around Mahim dargah in Mumbai could perhaps show the way. There are 18 eateries packed into the lanes running around the dargah, some over 70 years old, selling one-dish meals. It is usually mutton salan or gosht curry with roti and rice for Rs 20 a plate. There are 20-30 poor people huddled in front of each of these eateries waiting for dargah-goers to give some money to the owner to feed them. When the owner gets, say, a Rs 100 note, he gives food to five. “People donate anywhere between Rs 50 to Rs 500. I feed these one-dish meals to about 250 to 300 people every day,” says Mohammed Ali, one of the cafe owners. Is it time to model our weddings on this?

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By Smita Mitra with Anuradha Raman in Delhi, K.S. Shaini in Bhopal, Madhavi Tata in Hyderabad

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