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WORLD  Bharti's Beef With McDonald's FROM REDIFF.COM  USA, May 12 (VNN) — If you are a Hindu and you live in the United States, and you have ever so much as contemplated putting McDonald's French fries in your mouth, then you have just been dragged into a multi-million dollar lawsuit against the mammoth company, thanks to Seattle lawyer Harish Bharti. Whether you know it or not, Bharti is working hard on your behalf. He wants the behemoth multinational to cough up 'hundred of millions of dollars' for allegedly fooling the one million plus Hindus in the US -- and 15 million or so non-Hindu vegetarians -- into eating the greasy finger food for years. For years, McDonald's has touted its ever-popular fry-cooked in 100% vegetable oil as safe-eating for vegetarians, Bharti contends. But behind the scenes, in a nondescript pre-cooking step, that wayward clown Ronald McDonald has been secretly adding a miniscule amount of beef tallow to preserve his fry's finger-licking flavor. Yeah, so what? the company says. We do add a small amount of beef flavoring to our fries, but we have never promoted it as a vegetarian item. Besides, we are obeying all the laws on ingredient disclosure. Not good enough, Bharti has fired back. You have engaged in deceptive business practices, so you hadd better pay up to settle my clients' stomachs. Amid a media maelstrom that would have made O J Simpson lawyer Johnny Cochran envious, the savvy attorney filed his class action lawsuit against McDonald's on Tuesday. (He already has another class action suit going on the side against aerospace giant Boeing on behalf of Asian Americans.) The suit names two troubled Hindus -- Brij M Sharma and Charanjit Singh -- and one non-Hindu vegetarian -- Lisa M Bertini -- as the plaintiffs. Outside observers are already calling the new case a drive-through nuisance suit which may be quietly settled out of court to mitigate a PR nightmare that's just begun to buzz. But if it settles for even a fraction of the 'hundreds of millions of dollars' Bharti has sought, it will be will be a big payoff for the trial lawyer, the three plaintiffs he represents, and perhaps 'several dozen' other angry Hindus and veggies he says he has signed up as clients. Needless to say, with all this on his plate, Bharti is busy these days. But before dashing off for a pressing engagement with CNN, he made time for a quick chat with rediff.com Assistant Editor Nirshan Perera. Why are you filing this case? My clients have been deceived by McDonald's. Some 1 million or so are Hindus and for them eating beef is against their religion. Who are your clients? All Hindus. Who are the members of this class action lawsuit? Most Hindus are vegetarian. Even those who are non-vegetarian wouldn't eat beef knowingly. Every Hindu who follows the faith and is faithful to their religion falls in this class. In addition to that I have about 15 million non-Hindu US people who are vegetarians by choice. They were represented by McDonald's for over 11 years, including by their CEO, in media releases, and they had a big campaign starting in the 1990s, saying that from now on we will use only 100% vegetable oil to cook our fries. So all these people have been eating beef not knowing that. In your opinion, does that phrase-cooked in 100% vegetable oil-imply that it's a vegetarian item? They have been deceptive and they have been saying to people that this is vegetarian. I have hundreds of calls from non-Hindu vegetarians saying that they repeatedly asked them... Read full story at: http://www.rediff.com/news/2001/may/04us1.htm Also read related story at: http://rediff.com/money/2001/may/05mac.htm  Comment on this storyContact VNN about this storySend this story to a friend
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