The News Minute| November 18, 2014| 12.30 pm IST
The fourth edition of India’s version of the MasterChef show is coming soon, and for all lovers of the original show, this comes as good news.
Three seasons of MasterChef India have gone down, and added to the melodramatic format of the desi version of the show complete with tears and suspense, it has been well-received.
However, this year, the show comes with a huge change – it will be all vegetarian.
According to reports, the show which is sponsored by two big corporate names in the Indian industry, the Adani Wilmar and Amul , will go completely veggie giving opportunity for all cooks (Indian) not comfortable with cooking non-vegetarian food an equal opportunity to participate and compete fairly .
It is not clear who initiated the idea to tweak the original MasterChef show concept, however, atleast one of the sponsors have had a large say in this , said the Economic Times.
Both corporates have Gujarat roots, with Amul owned by the Gujarat Cooperative Milk Marketing Federation and Adani Wilmar, with Adani Group headquarted at Ahmedabad. The latter has begun sponsoring MasterChef India only since last year, according to the report.
This move makes India’s version of the MasterChef show the only show to go vegetarian in the world.
According to ET, only 20 per cent of the dishes whipped up at these shows worldwide have been vegetarian.
For so long, dishes at the MasterChef have included everything from lip-smacking Chicken Mughalais to Mutton Kheema dishes. So what instigated this move to make Master Chef go vegetarian? We wonder.
If the reason is that majority of Indians are vegetarians, it will be quite far from reality. We are the fourth-fastest growing market for chicken in the world, said a Mint report. Even in terms of fish, we come at seventh position in the fastest growth in terms of consumption in the last two decades.
This isn’t all. India is also home to many closet non-vegetarians, as in people who don’t eat meat at home, but enjoy their share outside at restaurants.
Culinary experts say allowing only vegetarian dishes will give cooks more opportunity to be more creative.
The number of bans against a variety of items in India has been quite worrying. Kerala brought out its ban against alcohol. Gujarat is already a dry state and doesn’t really sell non-vegetarian items everywhere (You need to hunt for meat-serving places).
Hopefully, someone isn't hoping that India heads towards becoming a vegetarian country any time soon. People might be able to survive without alcohol, but for meat-lovers in the country anything close to that could be a visa out of the country.