The Jammu and Kashmir administration has suspended a senior official for purportedly telling his juniors over lunch that the Rig Veda allows the eating of non-vegetarian food.

Rajouri district magistrate Vikas Kundal suspended Abdul Rashid Kohli, assistant commissioner (panchayat), on Tuesday night for allegedly making “objectionable remarks about a particular religion” and instituted a probe.

Officials said the BJP leadership had taken the matter up with the administration, seeking action against Kohli.

“This office has received a complaint that AC Panchayat has made some objectionable remarks about a particular religion,” the suspension order issued by Kundal said.

The suspension order claimed the comments had the potential to create law-and-order problems, and that the official had violated service conduct rules. No further details were given. Officials said the action followed a complaint from one of the four subordinates before whom Kohli had made the purported remarks while they were lunching at a restaurant in Rajouri, Jammu.

Kohli told The Telegraph he had gone out for lunch with four “village-level workers” (VLWs) — two Muslims and two Hindus.“Four of us, including a Hindu VLW, ordered non-veg food but one ordered vegetarian food. There was a discussion whether the Rig Veda allowed the eating of non-veg food,” he said.

“I had read on the Internet that the Rig Vega allows non-veg food, and asked why two of them (the Hindus) differed. After that, we parted peacefully.”Kohli added: “I never realised that he (one of the Hindu VLWs) had felt offended. Had he told me, I would have apologised. I never intended to offend him and never asked him to eat non-veg food. But late in the evening, I learnt that he was registering a complaint.”BJP general secretary Vibodh Gupta said in a video message that local youths were angry at Kohli’s “objectionable” comment.

He alleged that Kohli had asked his Hindu subordinates why they had not ordered non-veg food.“We don’t want his suspension; he should be fired. We request the police to lodge an FIR under Section 153 IPC (provocation with intention to cause riot) so that the community against which objectionable remarks have been made will feel that there has been action,” he said.

Gupta underlined that the remarks had come not from a “driver or conductor” but from a senior Kashmir Administrative Service officer who “perhaps does not like Rajouri’s (achievements in) peace and development”.Rajouri is a Muslim-majority district in Jammu’s Pir Panchal region. Kundal has formed a committee, headed by additional district development commissioner Pawan Parihar, to probe the matter and hand in a report within 15 days.