Osmania University's 'Beef Festival' takes Twitter by storm

16 April, 2012

A student was stabbed and two vehicles set alight after students from two Hindu communities clashed..

THE BEEFED up security might have stopped students from warring factions at the Osmania University from attacking each other physically but social networking sites such as Twitter and Facebook have become an alternate source to vent anger. The violence that followed after students from Dalit community organised a beef-festival on the campus to protest ‘food-fascism’ has literally taken the virtual world by storm.

Among all the harsh tweets, ridiculing people’s sentiments, a tweet by Adithya Shyam was a good read. “Osmania University should have set up colleges in Kerala. Forget #BeefFest, we would have had a #BeerFest too......in peace,” he wrote. Pertinent to mention here is the fact that beef constitutes a large chunk of meat consumed in Kerala.

Whole most of the people argued for Dalits’ ‘right to food’ in this secular country, there were many others who found the ‘beef-festival’ an insult to their religious sentiments. Wrote"@singh_prakash: Beef fest in Osmania University shows brazenness of sections indifferent 2 majority feelings & cowardice of Hindus and BJP". Anoop Chathoth wrote on Twitter: “Osmania University should have had a Pork Fest parallel to the Beef fest so that everyone gets an equal chance to get offended.”

Trying to put in perspective the right to food and religion of every community, RohanKaul wrote on Twitter: “Buffaloes are sacrificed in the Kamakshya temple every year during Durga Puja.”Adding to it, Shehla Rashid wrote: “I don't eat beef. Should I force other people to refrain from it? No! If separate vessels are used at Osmania University what's the issue? Maintaining that beef was an important part of their cultural identity and an affordable source of protein, the festival was organised by Telangana Students Association, Progressive Democratic Student Union, Student Federation of India and student groups from English and Foreign Languages University.

Kancha Ilaiah, a Professor of Political Sciences is very critical of ABVP and RSS activists and alleges that ‘they have been imposing the Brahmanical culture since Britishers left India, where everyone has the right to practice his/her religion and Indian constitutions enshrines the ‘right to food’ to every citizen’. “Dalits and other tribals have the right to eat whatever they want to and contrarily these Brahmans and VHP activists are portraying food rights as caste rights,” Said Mr Ilaiah.

Making it clear that nobody has the right to stop anyone from celebrating their festivals, Mr Ilaiah said that Beef was not the issue only in Osmania but across the whole country. “Osmania is just leading the movement. The students at JNU and the Delhi University colleges have been voicing their grievances about it,” he informed. “Besides giving beef a respectable identity, we want to make it clear that students coming from tribal areas who have tasted the food since they were born can’t be denied their fundamental right,” Mr Ilaiah added.

Despite all this, the Akhil Bharathiya Vidyarthi Parishad (ABVP), a student’s wing of BJP, driven from upper-caste Hindus challenged the festival and according to Zee News, a group of 50 students started pelting stones on the 200 students who were relishing beef-Biryani on the campus. In the ensuing violence several students were injured and the situation was brought to control after police lobbed tear gas shells on the warring factions.

The Dalit students have been demanding that Beef be made part of the hostel menu of the university, however the ABVP while condemning the festival have said that the festival hurt their sentiments. “We are not against anybody’s food habits,” India Today quoted an ABVP activist.

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COMMENTS (1)

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Deep Singh

No one should take law and order in their hand and the violence is not the result of any crisis and problem I also disagree with the thing that happened in Osmania University Beef Festival kind of things are not good for the society Even i think beyond the religious sentiments i feel it should be banned at public place People who want to eat such cuisine can eat at any place but not in public place