The Indian Couple Who Won a $200,000 Settlement Over ‘Food Racism’ at US University

A dispute that began over heating a dish in a microwave has ended with two Indian students winning a $200,000 settlement from a US university.

Aditya Prakash and his fiancee, Urmi Bhattacheryya, told the BBC they filed a civil rights lawsuit against the University of Colorado, Boulder, after they faced a series of “microaggressions and retaliatory actions” following the microwave incident.

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Prakash and Bhattacheryya claim their ordeal began in September 2023. Prakash, a PhD student in the Anthropology Department at the university, was microwaving his lunch of palak paneer when a British staff member allegedly remarked that his food was giving off a “pungent” odour and told him that there was a rule against heating foods with strong odours in that microwave.

Prakash said the rule wasn’t mentioned anywhere and when he later inquired about which foods were considered pungent, he was told that sandwiches were not, while curry was.

Prakash alleged that the exchange was followed by a series of actions by the university which led to him and Bhattacheryya – who was also a PhD student there – losing their research funding, teaching roles and even the PhD advisers they had worked with for months.

In May 2025, Prakash and Bhattacheryya filed a lawsuit against the university, alleging discriminatory treatment and a “pattern of escalating retaliation” against them.

In September, the university settled the lawsuit. {snip}

According to the terms of the settlement, the university agreed to give the students their degrees but denied all liabilities and banned them from studying or working there in future.

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