Congress leader Rahul Gandhi, who participates in a Bharat Jodo Yatra, met members of a ‘Village Cooking Channel Channel’, a popular YouTube channel, in Kanyakumari. The YouTube channel is known for its videos about the traditional cooking of village food in open fields. The channel’s creators had gained a pan-Indian appeal last year when Mr Gandhi took part in an outdoor session cooking mushroom biryani during the election campaign. It is Tamil Nadu’s first YouTube channel to reach one crore (10 million) subscriber.
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In last year’s video, Mr. Gandhi joined the chefs making the biryani and mixed the raita, saying the names of the ingredients aloud in Tamil, in the same way the chef does in the videos.
Launched in 2018 by former caterer Periyathambi, the channel now has nearly 18 million subscribers. His grandchildren Ayyanar, Murugesan, Tamilselvan, Muthumanickam and Subramanian are the other members who appear on the channel.
The team of six initially started this channel as a pastime. But soon their content went viral and each video gained more and more views. The videos generally show these people cooking traditional South Indian dishes and other exotic recipes in agricultural fields, using traditional cooking methods.
Gandhi launched the Bharat Jodo Yatra – the Congress party’s mega march – from Kanyakumari on Wednesday evening. It is seen as an attempt by the party to rally support in the run-up to the 2024 general election.
Prior to the launch, Mr Gandhi visited the monument of his father and former Prime Minister Rajiv Gandhi in Sriperumbudur, where he was killed in a terrorist attack by the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Elam (LTTE).