India food safety crackdown targets company of Nepal’s ‘Noodle King’
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Maharashtra Food and Drug Administration (FDA) officials inspecting duplicate labels bearing altered ingredient information during a raid at a warehouse in India on Aug 25.
PHOTO: REUTERS
- India ordered CG Foods India, owned by Nepal’s billionaire Binod Chaudhary, to stop some Wai Wai noodle products due to unhygienic practices in their factory.
- Inspectors found broken noodles collected from the floor were re-processed into bhujia snacks without proper heat treatment, violating food safety rules.
- Authorities seized 32,000 kg of stock and expired goods, started legal actions, and samples were taken for testing amid a wider food safety crackdown in India.
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NEW DELHI – India on Sept 4 ordered a Nepali billionaire’s company, popular for its Wai Wai noodles, to discontinue some products after an investigation found its factory used unhygienic “floor-collected, broken noodles” in making its snacks.
The crackdown is part of an unprecedented food-safety drive in India, where federal and state officials are taking strict action against eateries and brands ranging from Domino’s and Pizza Hut to Diageo for any food safety, hygiene or labelling lapses.
The order on Sept 4 was issued to a CG Foods India factory in Rajasthan state in western India, which is part of CG Corp Global, led by Nepal’s only billionaire Binod Chaudhary, nicknamed the “Noodle King”.
The regulator’s investigation focused on two Wai Wai-branded products called bhujia – a fried Indian snack sold by many companies in the country in tiny packs.
Inspectors found “reprocessing floor-collected broken noodles into bhujia without heat treatment”, the Food Safety and Standards Authority of India (FSSAI) said in a social media post.
CG Foods India said in a statement that it is fully cooperating with the regulatory process and remains “committed to maintaining the highest standards of food safety, quality and compliance”.
The authorities seized 32,000 kg of stock from the factory, as well as 1,925 boxes of expired finished goods, the FSSAI said, adding that “strict legal proceedings” were initiated against the food business operator.
Samples have been collected for testing, it added.
Last week, Indian authorities raided an illegal operation in Mumbai that faked expiry dates and nutritional information on original food products manufactured by PepsiCo, Nestle and others so that they could be exported to other countries. REUTERS
