00:00 Dropping meat is not all that difficult.
00:07 We make that happen every day.
00:11 As far as our organization is concerned, we do not have an exact number, but the estimate
00:20 is tens of thousands of people who would have dropped meat and a relatively smaller number
00:29 who would have dropped dairy as well.
00:33 Let's say 50% of those who have dropped meat.
00:37 So that happens.
00:41 And it's not as if people drop it for a while and then go back to it.
00:46 We know for sure that there are people who dropped it five years back and have no inclination
00:52 at all to revert to meat.
00:55 People who drop meat probably need to give them a strong enough reason.
01:07 Had we been so mad after meat, we would have dug up corpses and enjoyed their meat as well.
01:20 Had we been so mad after meat, then the Muslim would have gone after pork and the Hindu would
01:28 have gone after beef, but we don't do that.
01:33 Once we have a strong reason to not consume meat, we listen.
01:44 That reason is missing.
01:46 Everybody needs to have the clarity and the voice and the power to bring that reason to
01:55 the population.
01:56 People will listen and I believe in the intrinsic goodness of every person.
02:05 We all behave in very very pitiable ways.
02:10 We know that, we see that, that often times we behave as if we are absolute monsters,
02:18 but still the potential to be very very good remains within all of us and I have faith
02:26 in that.
02:28 So I would not be a cynic and feel that it's Kali Yuga and it's therefore very difficult
02:39 to evoke compassion inside a person or that this current generation has gone to dogs and
02:47 now nobody can rectify them.
02:50 I don't subscribe to all this.
02:53 I think if we can talk to them properly with due reasons and
03:06 get them to act from the right centre within, things can change, things can change quite swiftly.
03:23 Last question from my side.
03:27 How do you think veganism will fare in the coming years?
03:30 Where do you see it going in the next couple of years basically?
03:34 How will the growth be?
03:35 There are two different trajectories and the vegan movement will follow one of them or
03:48 be situated at some point in the middle of them.
03:57 The first trajectory is the way it is currently going.
04:02 It will remain a foreign concept, a thing for the rich, a fad for the elite.
04:18 That's how the general public takes it because I am in touch with the common populations
04:25 and dealing with people on an everyday basis is what I do.
04:28 So I know how they look at veganism.
04:31 That's one possibility.
04:33 The other possibility is you ask yourself again and again, what is it that made India
04:41 vegetarian and the same forces that made India vegetarian will make India vegan as well.
04:50 You will have to respect those forces.
04:52 You will have to channelize those forces in your favour.
04:56 Because veganism is nothing but the logical culmination of vegetarianism.
05:04 Where does vegetarianism come from?
05:08 The feeling that I will not kill the animal, I don't want to harm the animal.
05:13 That same feeling finds its final expression in veganism.
05:24 When I say killing the animal is very very bad, but when I am milking the animal, that
05:31 too is bad.
05:33 Not only that, when I am milking the animal, I am preparing the grounds for its slaughter.
05:40 [MUSIC]
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