All Eateries on Kanwar Yatra route in UP to display owners' names, orders CM Yogi Adityanath

Yogi Adityanath, the chief minister of Uttar Pradesh, issued an order on Friday requiring all restaurants along the Kanwar Yatra route to display the names of their owners outside their shops.

The decision was made one day after the Muzaffarnagar police had ordered the same for the entire district. In response to this, many opposition parties forced the police to withdraw their instructions.

The CM noted that this decision comes on the heels of the need to protect the stake and sanctity of the religious pilgrims. Now, every eatery, be it a restaurant, a roadside dhaba, or even a food cart, will have to display the name and details of the owner. 

Earlier today, Minister Kapil Dev Agarwal of Uttar Pradesh alleged that Muslim vendors are peddling non-vegetarian food to pilgrims while posing as Hindus. "They write names like Vaishno Dhaba Bhandar, Shakumbhari Devi Bhojanalaya, and Shuddh Bhojanalaya and sell non-vegetarian food," said the minister.

On Thursday, Akhilesh Yadav, the president of the Samajwadi Party, said that the Muzaffarnagar police's directive to eatery owners along the Kanwar Yatra route to post the names of their owners is a "social crime" and requested that the courts take suo motu cognisance of the issue.

Yadav posted on X in response to a news report about the injunction, saying, "And what if the owner's name is Guddu, Munna, Chhotu, or Fatte? What information can you get from these names?

Congress spokesperson Pawan Khera also denounced the decision as "state-sponsored bigotry." Similarly, AIMIM president Asaduddin Owaisi likened the measure to historical acts of discrimination, drawing parallels to apartheid in South Africa and the boycott of Jewish businesses in Nazi Germany.

The controversy escalated further as the Congress and AIMIM shared a video of Police Chief Abhishek Singh justifying the order with the media. Khera emphasised the need for collective opposition against such discriminatory practices, warning against regressing into obscurity under the BJP-led government.