Besides smashing the ‘vegetarian India’ myth, NFHS data also reveals how entrenched patriarchy dictates who is allowed to eat what.
Whatever may be the rhetoric or the narrative, even if the latter is a preponderantly dominant one, truth finds its own place to emerge. For years, many sections of Indian society, principally the right-wing segment, have peddled the story that India is primarily a vegetarian nation. Proclamations of this sort have been made time and again, although archaeological and anthropological data do not give any credence to such claims and assertions. The Vedas too do not support this narrative. In fact, it is unequivocally held that it was unviable to depend only on vegetarian food anywhere in the world even during the Vedic times.
