Odisha likely to lose West Bengal on patent over “Rasgolla”

04 April, Bhubaneswar

Odisha is likely to lose to West Bengal over its claim to get the geographical identification tag on Rasgolla, a sweet delicacy.

Both Odisha and West Bengal have been claiming that rasgolla originated from their state.

Odisha Science and Technology minister Pradip Kumar Panigrahi said so far written evidence to substantiate the ”our claim” has not been found.

Panigrahi said a public notice requesting people to provide evidence that rasgolla was prepared in Odisha was issued in October last year by a committee constituted under chairmanship of the director Bio Technology department.

But the committee has not got any response so far. There was no evidence to prove that rasgolla was prepared in Odisha before 1868.

The state government had set up three committees to prepare documents on the origin of rasgolla in Odisha and to help the state to stake claim before the central government for the patent over the sweet dish.

Panigrahi said though the committee held two meetings in Puri and it could not collect the evidence in support of the claim.

The minister said, according to “madala Panji” and and other ancient religious books rasgolla is offered to the presiding deities in the 12th century Jagannath temple Puri but there was no evidence to prove that it was originated in Odisha.

The experts on Jagannath culture also failed to provide any evidence in support of the claim, Panigrahi said.

He said the government would stop the exercise to collect the evidence in support of the claim that rasgolla was originated from Odisha if no evidence was found in the near future.