McDonald’s India has today been served the second legal notice for their evasive and unclear reply to the first one and for the subsequent delay in responding.

The 2nd Legal Notice to McDonald’s after their evasive interim reply to 1st legal Notice. They have to answer on the Policy of serving ONLY HALAL MEAT & either change it or court case pic.twitter.com/Xla5HeXOG0 — Ishkaran Singh Bhandari (@Ish_Bhandari) October 3, 2019

The popular fast-food chain which has been facing trouble ever since the global chain admitted on discriminating against non-Muslims as part of their business model in India in August 2019. One Harish Sharma had filed a legal notice to McDonald’s India through advocate Ishkaran Bhandari on August 26. The legal notice was sent to McDonald’s India, Mr Amit Jatia (Joint Venture partner and McDonald’s India’s Managing Director) and Mr Vikram Bakshi (Joint Venture partner and McDonald’s India’s Managing Director).

The second notice served today to Addressee no. 1- Mc Donald’s India, Addressee no. 2- Mr Amit Jatia (Joint Venture partner and McDonald’s India’s Managing Director) specifies that the defendants need to answer to the legal notice in full, failing which the plaintiff has the authority to take civil and criminal action against the addressee and/or another person concerned with the issue.

The first notice referred to the statement made by McDonald’s India in August where it asserted that all the meat used by them is Halal meat. The notice sought clarification from the food chain about their policy with regards to Jhatka meat which is more humane and also, is slaughtered and consumed mostly by Hindus and Sikhs as opposed to Halal meat, which is, by Sharia, slaughtered only by Muslims. Since Halal guidelines mandate that only Muslims are involved in the entire slaughtering and packaging process, the notice also said that McDonald’s is discriminating against other religions who are involved in the business and denying them the equal opportunity to earn.

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The notice further said that the tweet makes it evident that the food chain serves only Halal meat and not Jhatka or Kosher meat, and hence, choosing to serve only a specific kind of meat amounts to social, racial and religious discrimination and violates basic fundamental rights as enshrined in the Constitution. Further, it said that certain sects are barred from eating Halal meat since the process of slaughter is extremely painful for the animals and hence, by serving only Halal meat, McDonald’s is hurting the religious sentiments of such groups.

Despite demanding a response from the food chain within 15 days, McDonald’s India had been evasive in its response and asked for more time to respond to the legal notice in details.

The second legal notice served today specified that the claimant, Harish Sharma had not yet received any detailed reply from the defendants despite the time demanded by McDonald’s had concluded.

The practice of buying Halal meat exclusively by McDonald’s India could also invite charges under the SC/ST Act, OpIndia has learnt from Ishkaran Bhandari. This, since Jhatka meat, is mostly slaughtered and processed by members of the Scheduled Castes and Scheduled Tribes.