BBC under fire for cookery show stating Kashmir is in Pakistan

LONDON: The BBC is under fire after broadcasting a cookery show on Kashmiri cuisine that said the food is from “Azad Kashmir in northern Pakistan”.

The programme “Recipes that Made Me: Kashmir”, screened last Saturday in the UK on BBC One, referred to Kashmiri cuisine as “food of the Kashmiri immigrants from northern Pakistan” in an episode set in Yorkshire. The presenter, Indian-origin cook Nisha Katona, went to Bradford and said, “The majority of Pakistani immigrants came here from a relatively small region of Azad Kashmir in the far north of Pakistan.” The programme then showed a map of “Azad Kashmir” in Pakistan.

Not once did it refer to Kashmir as being in India.

It said lamb was at the heart of Kashmiri cuisine and featured lamb offal, lamb trotters, lamb seekh kebabs and lamb liver dishes. Katona said: “Lamb’s feet might not sound appealing but across the subcontinent we are used to eating every part of the animal. Thankfully lamb was easy to come by in Yorkshire.” She introduced Yazi, an expert on Kashmiri food, saying her father ,“like many Pakistani immigrants in this area, came from a farming family in rural Kashmir” and concluded the show saying “learning about Pakistani Kashmiri food has been a privilege”.

Shital Manga (43), a British Indian from Leicester who watched the programme hoping to learn new recipes, was left infuriated. “They are saying Kashmir is part of Pakistan when it isn’t, never has been and never will be. Even in the Puranas it says Kashmir is part of India. The valley of Kashmir is named after Kashyap Rishi, one of the Saptarshis (seven sages). They are calling it Azad Kashmir but it is not free, it is occupied by Pakistan. This is propaganda playing up to the Pakistani population in Britain. The map made me really angry. Azad Kashmir does not exist and Kashmir is part of India. In the 1990s there was a genocide of Hindus in that part of Kashmir. Either the script was written for the presenter or she doesn’t understand the real facts.”

Vinod Tikoo, who represents the Jammu Kashmir Study Centre in the UK, said: “The series talks about Kashmiri food from Pakistani occupied region of Jammu and Kashmir but the food and recipes shown are more mainstream Pakistani or from the Jammu region. The anchor confuses the audience by saying ‘Kashmir region of Pakistan’ where in reality the Kashmir Valley primarily is in the Indian region of Jammu and Kashmir. The host does not show the subtle yet substantial differences between the Hindu and Muslim cuisines of Kashmir.”

A BBC spokesperson said: “‘Recipes that Made Me’ celebrated the food of a range of communities from the Indian subcontinent.”