BENGALURU:Five visually-challenged mothers from the city will be participating in the third season of the cooking competition Zayka ka Tadka. Each day, a participant will cook something they’d like and the videos will go live on the Facebook page.Shekhar Naik, Padma Shri awardee and former captain of Indian Blind Cricket Team, has been chosen as the face of this competition. With 16 visually-challenged members in his family, Shekhar feels such competition will be a great motivational boost to visually-challenged people.
Asha Shivraj, 30, one of the participants, works at Employment State Health Insurance Corporation. She was born with vision loss. The Economics and English literature graduate learned cooking from Youtube, hearing different recipes and now enjoys making pulao and raita for her husband and son. “The first thing I learned to cook was chitrana. It was difficult to cook as I had no idea about cooking. I was terrified but my sister in-law helped me,” she says. She will be cooking puri and vegetable kurma for the contest. This is the first time Asha is participating in any cooking competition. She says, “This competition is not about winning but to inspire everyone.”
Another participant Suma B, 27, works for State Bank of India. She lost vision when she rubbed her eyes after some mud got into her eyes accidently while playing. She was a little under three years then.
She learned cooking only after marriage with the help of her partially blind friend. “I enjoyed the whole cooking experience. The first thing I cooked was lemon rice. So, I’d be preparing the same on Saturday for the competition,” she says. Now, she feels cooking is easy and regrets not learning it sooner. Suma says she is also equally nervous about participating in her first cooking competition. However, she understands how this could inspire other visually-challenged people.
Zayka ka Tadka was started in 2016 by Vijay Haldia and her daughter Apeksha Haldia. It aims to provide a live cooking platform to moms and homemakers in India.The third season of the competition is on from September 19 to September 23. Every day, the cooking will go live on the Facebook page of Zayka Ka Tadka at 4 pm. The winner will be decided based on the likes and comments on the Facebook page and scores by Shekhar Naik. All participants will receive a set of kitchen utensils.