Sharing might be caring, but Bengal’s love for the tuber may be at the root of its potato protectionist stance.
Dec 5, 2024 05:24 IST First published on: Dec 5, 2024 at 04:50 IST
In West Bengal, the potato is in the eye of a storm — production shortage has prompted the state to stop its export to neighbours Jharkhand and Odisha, causing prices to shoot up in those states. Bengal, which produces about 90-100 lakh tonnes of potatoes every year, also happens to be among its biggest consumers — Bengalis consume about 60 lakh tonnes of potatoes annually.
Sharing might be caring, but Bengal’s love for the tuber may be at the root of its potato protectionist stance. Like mustard oil and machher jhol, the two go back a long way. It pops up in West Bengal’s street food like phuchka, in the alu posto that precedes the Sunday mutton curry, incomplete in itself without the melt-in-the-mouth goodness of the golden fried potato, or in winter, as an accompaniment to fluffy karaishutir kochuri. As for the Kolkata biryani, with its boiled egg and potato, most Bengalis will pay a debt of gratitude to Wajid Ali Shah: Exiled to Bengal, with his wealth fast depleting, the last nawab of Awadh is credited with having fluffed up the biryani with an egg and potato to replace the copious amounts of meat required for the delicacy. While this might not be entirely historically accurate, it is not difficult to see why falling production might set off a crisis in the state.
There is a darker subtext too, to Bengal’s connection with the potato. British enterprise had introduced the root vegetable in the state’s Hooghly belt in the late 18th century. The plant’s hardiness meant that it would soon become widely cultivated and affordable. During the Bengal Famine of 1943, caused as much by Winston Churchill’s policy failure as by drought, inflation and hoarding, it would be potato peels and rice gruel — food wastes essentially — that would provide subsistence to many and spawn a culture of root-to-stem economising that continues to this day.
