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Rasgulla (literally "syrup filled ball") is a syrupy dessert popular in the eastern part of South Asia. It is made from ball-shaped dumplings of chhena dough, cooked in light sugar syrup. This is done until the syrup permeates the dumplings.
While it is near-universally agreed upon that the dessert originated in the eastern Indian subcontinent, the exact locus of origin is disputed between locations such as West Bengal, and Odisha, where it is offered at the Puri Jagannath Temple.
In 2017, when West Bengal got its rosogolla's geographical indication (GI) status, the Registry Office of India clarified that West Bengal was given GI status for Banglar rosogolla and Odisha can claim it too if they cite the place of origin of their variant along with colour, texture, taste, juice content and method of manufacturing. In 2019, the Government of Odisha was granted the GI status for "Odisha rasagola" (Odia rasagola).
Yet another theory is that rôśôgolla was first prepared by someone else in Bengal, and Das only popularised it. In Banglar Khabar (1987), food historian Pranab Ray states that a man named Braja Moira had introduced rôśôgolla in his shop near Calcutta High Court in 1866, two years before Das started selling the dish.
In1906, Panchana Bandopadhyay wrote that rôśôgolla was invented in the 19th century by Haradhan Mondal (Moira), a Phulia-based sweetmaker who worked for the Pal Chowdhurys of Ranaghat. According to Mistikatha, a newspaper published by West Bengal Sweetmeat Traders Association, many other people prepared similar sweets under different names such as gopalgolla (prepared by Gopal Moira of Burdwan district), jatingolla, bhabanigolla and rasugolla. Food historian Michael Krondl states that irrespective of its origin, the rôśôgolla likely predates Nobin Chandra Das. A sales brochure of the company run by Das' descendants also hints at this: "it is hard to tell whether or not cruder versions of similar sweets existed anywhere at that time. Even if they did, they did not match the quality of Nobin Chandra, and having failed to excite the Bengali palate, they slipped into oblivion."Bhagwandas Bagla, a Marwari people businessman and a customer of Nobin Chandra Das, popularised the Bengali rôśôgolla beyond the shop's locality by ordering huge amounts.
Today, canned rasgullas are available throughout India, Pakistan and Bangladesh, as well as in South Asian grocery stores outside the Indian subcontinent. In Nepal, Rasgulla became popular under the name Rasbari.
The Indian space agency, ISRO, is developing dehydrated rasgullas and other dishes for Indian astronauts in its planned crewed missions.
In 2015, the Odisha government initiated a move to get Geographical indication (GI) status for the rasagulla made in Pahala. On 30 July, the people of Odisha celebrated "Rasagola Dibasa" ("Rasgulla Day") to reaffirm Odisha as the place of the dish's origin. In August, West Bengal decided to legally contest Odisha's move to obtain GI Status. In 2015 The Odisha state government constituted three committees to claim over the rasgulla. The committees submitted their interim report to the government. Noted journalist and food researcher Bhakta Tripathy and a member of the committee had submitted dossier containing historical evidence of rasgulla origin in Odisha. The Science and Technology department of the West Bengal government also started the process to get its own GI status for the dessert.
The Jagannath Temple scholars such as Laxmidhar Pujapanda and researchers like Jagabandhu Padhi state that the tradition has existed since the 12th century, when the present-day temple structure was first built. Pujapanda states that the Niladri Bije tradition is mentioned in Niladri Mahodaya, which is dated to the 18th century by Sarat Chandra Mahapatra. According to Mahapatra, several temple scriptures, which are over 300 years old, provide the evidence of rasgulla offering ritual in Puri.
According to folklore, Pahala (a village on the outskirts of Odisha's capital Bhubaneswar) had a large number of cows. The village would produce excess milk, and the villagers would throw it away when it became spoilt. When a priest from the Jagannath Temple saw this, he taught them the art of curdling, including the recipe for rasagulla. Pahala thus went on to become the biggest market for chhena-based sweets in the area.
According to Asit Mohanty, an Odia research scholar on Jagannath cult and traditions, the sweet is mentioned as "Rasagola" in the 15th-century text Odia Ramayana of Balaram Das.
The text mentions rasagola along with other sweets found in Odisha. There is also mention of many other cheese sweets like chhenapuri, chhenaladu and rasabali. Another ancient text Premapanchamruta of Bhupati also mentions cheese ( chhena). It is being argued that cheese making process was well known before coming of Portuguese in Odisha.
According to the Bengali culinary historian Pritha Sen, in the mid-18th century, many Odia people cooks were employed in Bengali homes who arguably have introduced Rasgulla along with many other Odia dishes, but there is no substantial claim to prove that. According to another theory, it is possible that the Bengali visitors to Puri might have carried the recipe for rasgulla back to Bengal in the nineteenth century. But no substantial claim regarding that was ever found by any historian or anyone else.
This claim is contested by Bengali historians. According to food historians K. T. Achaya and Chitra Banerji, there are no references to cheese (including chhena) in India before the 17th century. The milk-based sweets were mainly made up of khoa, before the Portuguese India influence led to the introduction of cheese-based sweets. Therefore, the possibility of a cheese-based dish being offered at Jagannath Temple in the 12th century is highly unlikely. According to Nobin Chandra Das' descendant Animikh Roy and historian Haripada Bhowmik, rasgulla is not even mentioned as one of the chhappan bhog ("56 offerings") in the early records of the Temple; the name of the sweet was coined in Bengal. They also state that it would have been a blasphemy to offer something made from spoiled milk (chhena) to a deity. However, Michael Krondl argues that Hindu dietary rules vary from region to region, and it is possible that this restriction did not exist in present-day Odisha. But at the same time, he could not give any substantial information to uphold the claim that he was forwarding.
It has been agreed upon to celebrate the Rasagola Dibasa every year on the tithi of Niladri Bije in the lunar calendar. In the year 2016, the Rasagola Dibasa has been celebrated on 17 July.
The GI Registrar office at Chennai later specifically clarified that West Bengal was given GI status only for the Bengali version of Rasgulla ("Banglar Rasogolla"), not for the sweet's origin. The office also stated that Odisha had not by then applied for any GI tag, but it could also get Odisha Rasgulla's GI tag by presenting the necessary evidence.
In 2018 Odisha applied for GI status in Chennai GI Registry. On 29 July 2019, the GI Registry of India granted Odisha the GI status for "Odisha Rasagola", which is the Odia version of Rasgulla.
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