A couple of weeks ago, in his monthly ‘Mann Ki Baat’ radio programme, Prime Minister Narendra Modi expressed his concern about wastage of food. Probably taking a cue from that, the NDA government is now looking to fix the portion sizes of the dishes served by star hotels and restaurants.

Ram Vilas Paswan, minister of consumer affairs, food and public distribution, said, “If a person can eat only two prawns, why should he or she be served six? If a person eats two idlis, why serve four! It’s wastage of food and also money people pay for something that they don’t eat.”

© Twitter

The ministry is now working on drafting a questionnaire for hotels and restaurants to explain what dish sizes they should serve to a customer.

While talking to Hindustan Times, Paswan said, “They are the experts. They should tell us the maximum amount of a dish a person can eat. You go to a Chinese restaurant; they give you so much (of food). We are going to call them (stakeholders) for a meeting. The PM is concerned about food wastage and so we are going to issue instructions to these hotels (about the amount of food to be served).”

He also further clarified that these instructions would be imposed mainly on “standard hotels” and not dhabas that “usually serve thalis.”

Modi talked about the issue of food wastage at feasts and termed it as injustice to the poor in his ‘Mann Ki Baat’ radio programme.

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But is there really a need to regulate how much we’re eating? It varies from person to person and what if someone wants to eat more? Do they have to order two dishes? That would actually be more expensive for the customer. And I think everyone can agree that if we have leftover food, we don’t just waste it, we would like to get it packed and take it home to eat later. And if we’re eating at fancy restaurants or hotels, it is bound to be expensive and we surely would not like to waste our money by wasting the food. And, I doubt if the portion size goes down, the price would also go down. This will probably be more expensive for the customers and it’s not fair.

Even though how the government is planning on enforcing these portion sizes, but Twitter has already got on the government's case:

The government is in your kitchen, bathroom, bedroom, restaurant...its everywhere except in the parliament. https://t.co/QMC0wFLs9V

That's it. This is where the redline is. No amount of reforms can justify authoritarianism. https://t.co/tAscMwM1XT

Can I get extra if I show my Aadhar card? https://t.co/vYRoWmCldW

Other ideas
- elasticity of roomali roti
- inner & outer diameter of medu wada
- radius of poorihttps://t.co/6r7qIbgpIl

There are presently a lot more important issues that the government should focus on right now rather than monitoring how much someone is eating.