MP minister tells farmers to eat first, sell the rest

God is a scientist, and He knows what the pregnant woman needs to eat to maintain her haemoglobin levels .... As she should have more vitamin C through citric fruits, God puts in her the urge to eat sour thing.

Farmers should consume the food they produce and sell only what’s left, Madhya Pradesh women and child development minister Archana Chitnis said during an event in Shillong on Friday.

The minister cited an instance from Hindu mythology to drive her point home. “Lord Krishna fought with Kansa because he objected to the demon king’s demand that all the milk produced in Braj should go to Mathura (the capital of the kingdom). Lord Krishna said the residents of Braj will first consume all the milk they want, and only send what remains,” she said.

Chitnis was speaking at a seminar on ‘nutrition-sensitive agriculture’, jointly organised by her ministry and the Deen Dayal Research Institute in coordination with the ministry of culture.

In a controversial claim, the minister also said that a woman’s craving for something sour being seen as an indication of her pregnancy was not a Bollywood cliché but God’s way of telling would-be mothers to consume more vitamin C.

“God is a scientist, and He knows what the pregnant woman needs to eat to maintain her haemoglobin levels .... As she should have more vitamin C through citric fruits, God puts in her the urge to eat sour things,” she said.

The seminar was organised with the intention of encouraging people to fulfil their nutritional needs by consuming local produce. Chitnis dipped into mythology to explain the changes in nutrition and eating patterns.

Expressing regret over forestdwellers suffering from malnourishment in this age, she asked: “If forests were devoid of nutrition, how did Lord Ram and his wife, Sita, remain healthy for years (during their years of exile)?”

Blaming modern agricultural practices for malnutrition, the minister called on farmers to focus more on nutrition then food production. She cited the example of MP to illustrate how many of its residents suffer from malnutrition despite being the second-largest milk producing state in India. “In two districts, we found people suffering from malnutrition because they were moving away from the tradition of cultivating and eating millets,” she said.