By Team Ayurved Sutra
Posted on
Food is life : Health with Mahatma Gandhi
Whilst it is true that man cannot live without air and water, the thing that nourishes the body is food. Hence the saying, food is life.
Food can be divided into three categories : vegetarian, flesh and mixed. Flesh food include fowl and fish. Milk is an animal product and cannot be any means be included in a strictly vegetarian diet. It serves the purpose of meat to a very large extent. In medical language it is classified as animal food. A layman does not consider milk to be a animal food. On the other hand eggs are regarded by the layman as a flesh food. In reality, they are not. Nowadays sterile eggs are also produced. The hen is not allowed to see the cock and yet it lays eggs. A sterile egg never evolves into a chick. Therefore, he who can take milk should have no objection to take sterile eggs.
Medical opinion is mostly in favor of a mixed diet, although there is a growing school, which is strongly of the opinion that anatomical and physiological evidence is in favor of man being a vegetarian. His teeth, his stomach, intestines etc., seem to improve that nature has meant to man to be a vegetarian.
Vegetarian diet besides grains, pulses, edible roots, tubers and leaves, includes fruits, both fresh and dry. Dry fruits include nuts like almonds, pistachio, walnut etc.
I have always been favour of pure vegetarian diet. But experience has taught me that in order to be perfectly fit, vegetarian diet must include milk and milk-products such as curd, butter, ghee, etc. This a significant departure from my original idea. I excluded milk from my diet for six years. At that time, I felt none the worse for the denial. But in year 1917, as a result of my ignorance, I was laid down with severe dysentery. I was reduced to a skeleton, but I stubbornly refused to take any medicine and with equal stubbornness refused to take milk or buttermilk.
