Satvik Vegan Society

(Formerly Indian Vegan Society, since 2004. Oldest Vegan Organisation in India, with 'vegan' in it's name)

Karnataka
India
indianvegansociety@rediffmail.com

More About Us

Satvik Vegan Society (formerly Indian Vegan Society), founded by Shankar Narayan in 2004, is a registered public charitable trust. It is a member of the International Vegetarian Union (IVU, headquartered in the UK) and the Federation of Indian Animal Protection Organisations (FIAPO, headquartered in New Delhi).

Satvik Vegan Society has it's registered office in the state of Karnataka, India.

Email: indianvegansociety@rediffmail.com

Website: www.vgan.in

What Vegans Do:

1. Eat only 100% plant food and shun all animal origin foods including meat, poultry, fish, egg, milk and honey and their derivatives.

2. Avoid all animal origin/based products and services including leather, silk, wool, circuses, zoos, animal sports, animal entertainment, animal experimentation and animal sacrifice. Furthermore, we promote efforts to prevent cruelty to animals.

3. Eat healthy foods including vegetables, fruits, seeds, nuts and cereals, and avoid or reduce junk and processed food. Furthermore, we are physically active and strive for excellent health.

4. Use minimum possible resources and live in harmony with nature to help a sustainable environment.

5.Strive to develop good qualities and values and encourage others to adapt such qualities.

What We Do:

Satvik Vegan Society was born to provide an identity and a voice for vegans. Later, we included activities to create awareness about veganism, to support those who are interested in veganism and to help vegans be better vegans.

How We Do:

We organise vegan festivals, stalls at exhibitions, vegan talks, leaf-letting, school visits, newspaper articles, television interviews, newsletters, etc., to bring awareness to people about a lifestyle which is good for their health, less damaging to the environment and doesn't harm our fellow beings.

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A Brief History of Veganism in India:

”I have nothing new to tell the world, truth and non-violence are as old as mountains”, Mahatma Gandhi said. Practicing non-violence or Ahimsa has been advocated throughout India’s evolution and it has been an essential part of Indian ethos. In fact, ahimsa is the first and the most important step in the life of a yogi or attaining the status of Sthitaprajna or ideal/perfect human being. This practice of ahimsa in all aspects of life and leading a satvik life in modern times, influenced by Western World, has come to be known as ‘veganism’. (In other words, veganism is vegetarianism without its flaws). Veganism is a type of lifestyle practiced by modern humans in which they do not use, as far as possible and practical, any products or services derived by cruel means, especially from animals, in all aspects of their life, especially in diet, for the benefit of humans, animals and the environment, among others.

As can be seen in the first picture below, The Vegan Society of India (VSI) existed since, at least, as early as 1957, when India organized its first IVU World Vegetarian Congress. The VSI became non-functional with the death of its founder Mr.A.S.R. Chari of Bangalore in 1972 (second picture) and it took another 32 years before Indian Vegan Society (known as Satvik Vegan Society since 2014, www.vgan.in) was founded in 2004 by Mr.Shankar Narayan, then living, incidentally, in Bangalore.

Picture 1 - Vegan Society of India in 1957

Picture 2 - Excerpts from The Vegan Society's magazine Autumn 1973

Indian Vegan Society or Satvik Vegan Society (SVS) has been organizing at least one Vegan Festival every year to give an opportunity for vegans and non-vegans to come together in a peaceful place and celebrate righteousness.

As part of the Vegan Festival series, SVS has been organizing International Vegan Festivals (IVF). Globally, the first IVF was organized by Ms.Kirsten Jungsberg in Copenhagen, Denmark, in 1981. After travelling to several cities in many continents, 11^th International Vegan Festival came to Murudeshwar, India from Sep 30 to Oct 6, 2007. For the first time in the history of IVF, the event was opened to non-vegans also and IVF was made a vehicle to reach non-vegans with vegan message in addition to celebrating life in a harmless way.

Shankar Narayan speaking at the inauguration of the 11th International Vegan Festival in 2007

Inspired by the success of 11^th IVF, 3 more international vegan festivals (independent of international series) were organized by SVS in India. The next international vegan festival in India (16th International Vegan Festival) will happen from Aug 8 to 14, 2021 (7 days).

In addition to Satvik Vegan Society, there are many organisations and individuals who are promoting veganism among the public. USA based, People for Ethical Treatment of Animals (PeTA), founded by Ingrid Newkirk started its India operations in Mumbai in the year 2000. In addition to working for the animal rights and animal welfare, PeTA India has been advocating veganism. Mumbai based SHARAN India, started in the year 2005, has been promoting vegan diet in reversing the lifestyle diseases.

Federation of Indian Animal Protection Organisations (FIAPO), a federation of Indian animal organisations started in the year 2010, of which SVS is a member, has been serving only vegan food in all its events and promoting veganism, though they call it 'Living Free'.

Mumbai based 'Ahimsa Parmo Dharma Group' has been organising 'Ahimsafest', a huge vegan only exposition, with several other allied activities, since 2016. Dr.Susianto Tseng headed World Vegan Organisation had its 4th event "Vegan India Conference' in New Delhi in 2019 along with Vegan India Expo.

There are several business organisations selling vegan only products. The prominent among them are Karunya Musicals, Bangalore (who invented and sell vegan musical instruments like mrudanga and tabla) headed by Dr.Varadarangan, Justbe Resto Cafe, Bangalore (who serve only healthy vegan options) founded by Ms.Nidhi Nahata, Carrots Restaurant, Bangalore (vegan options only) started by Mr.Krishna Shastry and Veg Shoes, Kolkata by Mr.Manish Parekh.

In addition, the driving force behind the rapidly expanding vegan movement is a bunch of very committed vegan individuals based in all major cities helped by social media platforms like Facebook, Twitter, Whatsapp and a few highly visible sports and movie celebrities and their followers. Several vegan doctors, health coaches, food advisers also helping the cause though many of them like to be not identified as vegan but 'plant-based', There was a dedicated vegan magazine called Veg Planet and and several web portals, giving information on vegan living which also helped the vegan movement.

All these vegan promotion actvities are tacitly approved, appreciated and allowed by our present Prime Minister Mr.Narendra Modi and most of our religious and spiritual leaders and gurus. Their support and blessings have helped fuel the vegan movement and are paving the way for a vegan world.

Shankar Narayan, Founder of Satvik Vegan Society (SVS)

A born lacto-vegetarian (01.12.1964) and an admirer of Mahatma Gandhi since childhood, Shankar Narayan stopped drinking milk after reading Mahatma Gandhi's autobiography 'The Story of My Experiments with Truth' in 1989, when he was working in Bangalore (1986-96) as an Accountant & Administrator. He started 'Indian Vegetarian Association' (now defunct) in 1993 after seeing vegetarians being made fun of, for not eating meat, in Indian corporate workplaces and not getting enough food options in corporate events.

He came to know about veganism, The Vegan Society (UK) (www.vegansociety.com) and International Vegetarian Union (www.ivu.org, a global federation of vegan and veg organisations)) when he got internet access while working in Dubai, UAE (1996-2001) and became vegan on 1st June 2001, consciously and ethically.

Watching PeTA videos and getting to know about the darker side of the human civilisation from many sources including internet, he wanted to do something for veganism as a solution for the cruelty to animals and humiliation of humans who don't eat animals. As a result, in 2004, he wrote a small booklet on veganism in Kannada & started distributing the same to disseminate information on veganism and organising vegan events to bring together like-minded people and thus the Satvik Vegan Society (formerly Indian Vegan Society) was born. In the same year, he wrote Kannada page for the 'Vegan Passport', a travellers' companion giving details about veganism in world's many languages, published by the UK Vegan Society.

In 2006, when he was in Goa, he organised PeTA's 'Compassionate Citizen' events in several schools and a Teacher Training Program too. (He also organised a book release program for PeTA Founder Ingrid Newkirk for her book '50 Easy Ways Kids Can Help Animals' a year later). He organised a press meet before the IVU's 37th World Veg Congress (a vegan event, Sep 10-16, 2006) highlighting the event & the associated cause. He attended the Veg Congress on all days where he met many luminaries of the vegan movement such as Gurudev Chitrabhanu and Mr.Jashu Shah of The Vegetarian Society (Mumbai), Mr.Alex Hershaft (Founder of Farm Animal Reform Movement), Ms.Vanessa Clarke & Dr.Stephen Walsh of the UK Vegan Society, Ms.Marly Winckler of Brazil Vegetarian Society, Dr.George Jacobs of Singapore Vegetarian Society, Dr.Susianto Tseng of the Indonesian Vegan Society, Mr. Saurabh Dalal of the Vegetarian Society, Washington DC, Mr.John Davis, IVU Manager..In the IVU International Council elections held during the event, he was elected to the Council and made IVU Regional Coordinator for India and South-West Asia. (2006-2016)

He was invited to Dresden, Germany in 2008, for the IVU's Centenary Congress (1908-2008) where he spoke on the 'Origin and History of Vegetarianism in India'. After the event, he travelled to the Head Office of the UK Vegan Society (founder of Vegan Movement) in Birmingham and learned about their history and functioning. As part of the tour, he travelled to Cambridge, London, Leicester (all UK), Hanovar & Frankfurt (Germany), Paris (France), Brussels & Ghent (Belgium), Amsterdam (Holland), Luxemberg, Czech Republic & Dubai (on way back) to visit some vegan organisations, meet many vegan activists & speak at some events. He has also travelled to Batam, Indonesia in 2009 (Asian Vegetarian Congress), Jakarta, Indonesia in 2010 (IVU World Veg Congress), Dubai, UAE in 2010 (Middle East Veg Congress), Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia in 2013 (IVU World Vegfest).

He has also travelled within India extensively for FIAPO's India for Animals Conferences, Ahimsa Parmo Dharma Group's Ahimsafests in Mumbai, India Association Congresses and many other events as a speaker or to promote veganism.

In the year 2010, he started a quarterly printed newsletter called 'Vegan Vegetarian' for the benefit of the members of SVS. After a few years, it was stopped when the social media became more effective in disseminating information.

He has been organising annual Vegan Festivals since 2004, (in 2009 - 2 events), the 19th festival will take place on Aug 14, 2022. Among these, 4 events were International Vegan Festivals (2007, 2010, 2013 and 2016). The International Vegan Festivals organised by him are ranked one among the 5 most popular vegan events of the world.

Veganism is the practice of the ancient Indian value 'Ahimsa'. Along with 'ahimsa', Shankar Narayan wanted to give importance to other important values in Indian ethos, such as, Sathya, Asteya, Brahmacharya, Aparigraha, etc. (incidentally Mahatma Gandhi used to practice all these), therefore, Indian Vegan Society was renamed Satvik Vegan Society in 2014.

After this, two important spiritual vegans from the USA travelled in India. First, it was Dr.Will Tuttle, the author of the famous 'The World Peace Diet' who had a 10 city Vegan Talk-Piano Music tour of India, from Oct.26 to Nov.5, 2017. Shankar coordinated the entire tour taking help from volunteers in different cities.

In 2018 (Jul 31 to Aug 18), another spiritual vegan Dr.Joanne Kong from the USA was in India for a Vegan Talk-Piano Music tour. Again, Shankar had the opportunity to coordinate her tour and accompany her during most part of the tour.

Itinerary: Aug 1,2 & 3 (Wed, Thu, &Fri): Mangalore, Aug 4 & 5 (Saturday & Sunday): 16th Satvik Vegan Festival, Sthitaprajna, Byndoor. Aug 6, Monday: Panaji, Goa Aug 7, Tuesday, Coimbatore Aug 8 - 10, Bangalore Aug 11, Saturday: Hyderabad Aug 12, Sunday, Pune Aug 13-15: Mumbai Aug 16, Thursday: Surat Aug 17, Friday: Ahmedabad

Wanting to do more for the mother Earth, he bought an empty land of about 3 acres in Coastal Karnataka in 2008 and developed it as a rain forest after naming it Sthitaprajna. Today it is a vibrant forest with several wild animals, birds and reptiles visiting and staying there and doubles as Shankar's residence and also the venue for the annual Satvik Vegan Festivals. Having lived alone in this forest without electricity for the first 4 years and most of the last 12 years without telephone or Internet, he likes to be be called a 'Forest Man' or 'Father Forest' as called by a national newspaper in a report.