In an interview with the BBC, Michelin star chef Vikas Khanna sharply corrected the anchor who conjectured that the chef’s generosity of feeding homeless and destitute in India amidst coronavirus lockdown was triggered by his own sense of hunger while he grew up in India.
“You have been famous now. You have cooked for Obamas, you have
been on Gordon Ramsay’s show. But, you were not always like this. You are not
from a rich family so I dare say you understand how precarious it can be in
India,” the BBC anchor said imperiously.
However, Khanna, with his cool demeanour, tersely dispelled the
unfounded notions held by the BBC anchor. “My sense of hunger did not come from
India so much because I was raised in Amritsar and we have a huge community
kitchen where everyone gets fed. The entire city can be fed from the community
kitchen,” Khanna said while referring to the pervasive langars in the city that
provide food to people.
Vikas Khanna's reply to BBC anchor wins the internet
Vikas Khanna's reply to BBC anchor wins the internet
He further added that his sense of hunger came from the sprawling American city of New York during his struggling days. “My sense of hunger came from New York, when I was struggling and really at the bottom. It was difficult for a brown kid to rise through, someone who had a dream of winning the Michelin star,” he said.
“Therefore my sense of hunger came from New York when I was living in Grand Central and sleeping around. It came from the United States, not from India,” Khanna emphatically added.
Vikas Khanna helps migrant labourers and poor with cooked meals
The
stark images of migrant labourers trudging on their foot empty stomach to their
native places across the breadth of India moved the celebrity chef into launching an initiative for those who had been adversely
affected by the coronavirus induced lockdown in the country.
Khanna
wanted to express his solidarity with those who were going hungry during the
lockdown in the wake of coronavirus pandemic. So he put out an appeal on social
media for those who were in the need of food during the pandemic and within no
time, he received a flurry of responses on social media requesting food for the
needy.
As
of June 3, Khanna had supported the distribution of sanitary napkins in Diamond
Harbour, West Bengal and bankrolled 57 food stations within petrol pumps in
Uttar Pradesh and Bihar to offer cooked meals to migrant workers hoofing it
towards their respective villages. Till June 3, he had approximately
distributed 9 million meals in more than 125 cities with the assistance of the
National Disaster Relief Force and several other collaborators.
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