Noted influencer Krish Ashok, author of Masala Lab, argued that India as a society has the most incredibly diverse cuisine for a very disturbing reason. “It is because each of us, within our own boundaries of region, religion, caste, and communities, is very intolerant to any flavours outside of that,” he said.  

He was speaking at the Renaiessence ‘26, an annual science and freethought seminar held in Bengaluru on Sunday. The seminar highlighted the need for nurturing a scientific temper, rational thinking, and the need to look beyond traditional religious frameworks. 

Noting that India’s very first restaurants came up in Udupi, he highlighted how the subcontinent, for the most part of its history, didn’t have a culture of public eating, as that involved walking into a place together with other people and eating the food cooked by someone else. 

“A schezwan dosa might look odd to you today. But the most authentic sambar you can think of today would have appeared like a schezwan dosa to someone from 400 years ago. Many ingredients in what we eat today, including tomato, carrot and beans, are a result of European colonisation. So, when we say a certain food is not authentic, it reflects our own intolerance,” he said. 

Alternative medicine

“As an Indian citizen, doctor, and a teacher, it is my constitutional right and duty to improve scientific temper,” said Cyriac Abby Philips, hepatologist and a prominent advocate of science-led medicine.  

Drawing from his clinical experience, he cited several instances of patients developing severe liver conditions after undergoing misguided Ayurvedic or homoeopathic treatments and noted that while alternative medicines are being pushed to the public with claims of being natural and safe, that’s not always the case. 

“We have a whole industry on complementary and alternative medicine that is being pushed to the public as beneficial. It survives not because of evidence, but because of religio-cultural immunity,” he pointed out.   

Science communicator Ananthapathmanabhan stressed the need to take science off its pedestal, arguing that presenting it from a position of moral superiority risks turning it into a dogma. “Scientific temper, humanism, spirit of inquiry and reform together form a cocktail. Nothing stands on it,” he said. 

Organised by rationalist platform esSENSE Global, the event saw a registration of nearly 600 people.