The Indian Council of Medical Research had mentioned in one of its earlier reports that detergents in milk caused food poisoning and gastrointestinal complications. It can also cause irreversible damage to the organs.
An X user’s post on how detergent was used to make milk look whiter and frothier has opened Pandora’s box on social media with several other users joining in to share their experiences with adulterated food.
It all started when an entrepreneur Ram (@ramprasad_c) — who was into manufacturing liquid detergent — recalled what one of his sales executives told him in 2005.
When asked if any customer had given any feedback regarding the fragrance, the sales executive said that a lot of people bought liquid detergents to add to milk. Apparently, it made the milk look whiter and frothier. He also claimed that a rival company had a similar product with a mild fragrance and that such customers preferred to use it instead.
“I told the guy we aren’t changing the product. I stopped consuming lassi, and yoghurt from those markets after that,” Ram said.
The post received nearly five lakh views and 4,500 likes. Responding to it, another X user shared a similar incident with a friend’s peanut candy manufacturing unit.
“One of my friends was running a peanut candy factory and the cook who turned out temporarily for work in the place of the permanent one, used to make more peanut candies which were much crispier… On enquiry, my friend came to know that this new cook was adding dishwash liquid to the raw mixture of candies before cooking and that’s what made them crispier and the production volume too was higher,” wrote Rocky Bhai (@Rockywill18).
The user added that his friend immediately sacked the cook and discarded the entire stock of candy. The factory was eventually shut down.
Detergents in milk cause food poisoning: Experts
A CSE report published in 2012 supported claims that detergent was indeed being mixed into milk. These adulterants are hazardous and cause irreversible damage to the organs. The Indian Council of Medical Research in an earlier report had mentioned that detergents in milk caused food poisoning and gastrointestinal complications, it added.
In 2016, then Union minister for science and technology Harsh Vardhan had told the Lok Sabha that two out of three Indians drink milk laced with detergent, caustic soda, urea and paint. He underscored the country’s struggle with adulteration of food items by unscrupulous traders.
More recently, popular spice brands MDH and Everest were banned by Singapore and Hong Kong due to quality concerns.
India’s food safety regulator has initiated further probe into the products of spice makers MDH and Everest as review of the popular brand intensifies, a report said on June 14.
The Food Safety and Standards Authority of India is also likely to penalise the Indian firms for “unsafe spices”, CNBC-TV18 said in a report.
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