New Delhi: An Indian woman was not allowed to order food in an Israeli cafe, Free Kasol, in Himachal Pradesh.
According to a post on Facebook by Stephen Kaye, the owner of the cafe, who himself is an Indian, refused to give his Indian friend a menu claiming it was a 'members only' cafe.
The photograph posted by Kaye on his page has also gone viral on social networking site with people outraged against the restaurant's discrimination.
Here is the full text of Kaye's post:
This restaurant in Kasol is called 'Free Kasol'. The freak asshole who runs it refuses to serve Indians. I walked in there with Ritika yesterday afternoon. They would not give her a menu claiming it was a 'members only' cafe.
The owner did not realise we were together, I then asked for the menu and he duly obliged. I pulled him up about his claim that it was members only and he decided to stick to this yarn. Conversation went like this.
"Why did you give me the menu then?" I asked him. "Because you asked to see it". "So once I had looked at it I would not have been able to place an order?" "That's right" he answered.
Obviously we were not convinced by the owner's explanation so asked a few puzzled looking diners if they had to show a membership card to walk into this cafe. Of course none of them had to do any such thing. I confronted the owner and accused him of blatant discrimination, he then tried to shoo me out and claimed loudly "it is my cafe and can do what I want!" We weren't prepared to leave under these circumstances and made it clear to the exclusively white and predominantly Israeli clientele that the owner was operating a form of apartheid in his cafe. They continued supping tea and eating schnitzels.
It transpired that the owner is in fact Indian and has visited Israel every year for the past 15 years. His explanation for excluding a customer based purely on her ethnicity was that he 'was in a bad mood'.
Kasol is a village in Himachal Pradesh, northern India.Ώ] It is situated in Parvati Valley, on the banks of the Parvati River, on the way between Bhuntar to Manikaran. It is located 42 km east of Kullu at the height of 1640 meters. Kasol is partitioned into Old Kasol and New Kasol on the either side of the bridge. Kasol is at distance of 5 kilometre from holy place Manikaran.
About Kasol
Kasol is a village in Himachal Pradesh. It is situated in Parvati Valley, on the banks of the Parvati River, on the way between Bhuntar to Manikaran.
Kasol is also a base for Himalayan trekking, to SarPass, Yanker Pass, Pin Parbati Pass and Khiriganga.
Visitors from Israel are common in Kasol and one can see the Hebrew language banners throughout the valley.
Kasol has a fair amount of hotels and camping sites. Mesmerising views are visible throughout the parvati valley.
