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HomeIndiaGovernanceIKEA and Haldiram’s served show cause notice after 'caterpillar found in biryani'

IKEA and Haldiram’s served show cause notice after ‘caterpillar found in biryani’

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Food regulator FSSAI finds ‘more violations’ at IKEA’s 1,000-seat restaurant in Hyderabad, sends samples for lab analysis.

New Delhi: The Food Safety and Standards Authority of India (FSSAI) has sent a show cause notice to Swedish home furnishings giant IKEA and popular Indian food chain Haldiram’s after a customer allegedly found a caterpillar in the vegetable biryani served at IKEA’s Hyderabad store.

IKEA, which has set up its largest restaurant with 1,000 seats at its first India store at Hyderabad, sources packed food items from local food vendors, and the biryani in question was sourced from Haldiram’s in Nagpur.

In a statement Wednesday, IKEA had said: “IKEA takes food safety and quality very seriously and customer health is always a priority.

“Following an incident on 31 August 2018, when a customer encountered a foreign object in the dish he ordered, IKEA India has voluntarily stopped sales of two of its most appreciated products — vegetarian biryani and samosa, sourced locally in India.”

Haldiram’s remained unavailable for comment at the time of publishing. This story will be updated when we receive a response.

The show cause notice by FSSAI was issued after a team of five officers inspected the premises.


Also read: Why you should not order the Basa fish at Indian restaurants


The regulator also found a couple of other food security lapses at IKEA.

“They were using plastics below 50 microns, which pose a major threat to the environment and are not allowed. Also, they were dumping wet and dry garbage in a common bin, which is against the food safety law,” Sudarshan Reddy, the food controller in-charge of Hyderabad, told ThePrint.

Reddy was one of the five officers who inspected the IKEA premises.

“We have sent show cause notices to IKEA and Haldiram’s. Also, our team has picked samples of the vegetable biryani along with samples of all other food products. We are awaiting a response from both the companies,” Reddy said.

“After we get the sample analysis report from the laboratory, we will take action if required.”

Besides Reddy, the team of officers included a medical officer, an additional director of veterinary and a veterinary officer from the Greater Hyderabad Municipal Corporation and an additional food controller.


Also read: How it took more than 12 years for world’s biggest furniture retailer to open a store in India


 

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