After Zomato got into the halal vs jhatka meat controversy recently, it is now McDonald's that has found itself in the spot. McDonald's is facing a boycott call, with #boycottmcdonalds trending after they said they serve halal meat in all their outlets. In response to a query, McDonald’s India replied that all their restaurants in India have a halal certificate and that the meat they use is of the highest quality.
cAll our restaurants have HALAL certificates. You can ask the respective restaurant Managers to show you the certificate for your satisfaction and confirmation. (2/2)
— McDonald's India (@mcdonaldsindia) August 22, 2019
Instantly, they faced backlash from users for serving halal meat, with many asking how they would cater to the Hindus and their food interests. McDonald's is being slammed for catering to less than '20 per cent' of the population in a non-Muslim majority country. Some users commented that eating halal meat was unacceptable for Hindus and Sikhs, and hence they were boycotting the food chain.
Some of them even commented, 'so, food has a religion', referring to food aggregator Zomato's epic comeback to a customer who purportedly cancelled an order because the delivery rider was a Muslim recently. Zomato had responded to the user by saying “Food doesn’t have a religion. It is a religion.”
In #Halal the slaughter of animal is done in #Islamic ritual by reciting tasmiya or shahada in the name of #Allah. Also the animal suffer excruciating pain in the process.
— 🇮🇳 Bharat ye rehna chahiye 🇮🇳 (@iamniteshnaik) August 22, 2019
Why should Hindus forming 88% of your customers base consume such meat?@SouleFacts#BoycottMcDonalds
Well @McDonalds @mcdonaldsindia think Muslims are their only customers.
— vayu (@V__A__Y__U) August 23, 2019
Huh well meat eating Hindus and Sikhs. Now it is up to you if you still wanna go there.
Can you pls provide reasons why 70% Hindus/Sikhs etc of nation India are forced to eat by Macdonalds which is mandatory for only 20% Muslims?
— ॥ॐ॥Dharmatma🇮🇳⛳ (@dharmatma47) August 23, 2019
Macdonalds has always set benchmark in past in India & its time for Macdonald to do it again
Pls also provide jhatka to your customers🙏
However, this response was followed by a call to boycott Zomato. Zomato also instantly faced backlash for featuring restaurants with the 'halal' meat tag, and rightwing handles criticised the food aggregator for not offering a tag for restaurants offering 'Jhatka' meat, which is meat from animals slaughtered in the Sikh tradition.
