Dining at the St. Xavier Jesuit Residence was excellent as usual today. Breakfast offered great omelets, and lunch had chicken. That was different from last night’s chicken curry, or the fried chicken the day before or the chicken in rice the day before. Oh, are you seeing a trend here? Yes, we get served chicken at almost every meal except breakfast (then it’s eggs). It’s all good, but the neverending poultry offerings might grow pretty boring after a while. The chicken run is broken up by fish (excellent tuna steaks in a masala curry a few days ago), but the mainstay is chicken.
There’s a reason, of course. We are in India where 80.5 percent of the population is Hindu, which doesn’t eat beef, and 13.4 percent is Muslim, which doesn’t eat pork. Also, Ahmedabad is in the Indian state of Gujarat, which has one of the most restrictive laws concerning beef in India. It is illegal to slaughter cows or to sell purchase, or transport beef. The maximum penalty, according to a recent story in the Indian Express newspaper is imprisonment for seven years.
The Express blows away another stereotype, though, by pointing out that this is the most restrictive state concerning slaughtering cattle. Most of the rest have much less restrictive laws, including Kerala and the Northeast where not only are there no restrictions, but eating beef is common.
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