Shawarma is a hotel food item that often creates concern and fear in the field of food safety in the state. The latest in that series is the incident in which a man from Pala died while undergoing treatment due to food poisoning after eating shawarma at a hotel in Kochi. Some others who ate shawarma from the same hotel have already undergone treatment. Kakkanad municipal authorities closed the hotel based on the complaint and the food safety department collected samples from there as well. We can now expect state-wide inspections and follow-up from the Food Safety Department.

In 2012, a young man from Haripad had died of food poisoning after eating shawarma from a hotel in the capital. Shawarma became a hated item in hotels for a while after that. The Food Safety Department closed down hotels in many places and revoked their licences. Since then there have been several reports of food poisoning caused by shawarma. Even then, the authorities have taken inspections and formal follow-up actions. Experience tells us that this will continue to happen.

Who's responsibility is it to ensure the quality and safety of meat dishes including shawarma prepared in hotels? If the sellers have a social responsibility in this regard, the food safety department of the government has an administrative responsibility. Everyone has the right to get safe food from hotels. The question is whether the government is diligent enough to ensure this right.

Until the introduction of the Food Safety Act in 2006, the inspection system of the Food Safety Department was divided into sixty circles in the state. With the coming of the new law, officials have been appointed for inspection in all 140 constituencies. Checking the post-Covid increase in the number of hotels selling meat dishes will reveal how inadequate this system is. People's eating habits have also changed!

Each constituency will have four to five panchayats. How will a single food safety officer be able to carry out regular and efficient inspections and sample collection of food items over such a large area? The department has three analytical laboratories in the state at Thiruvananthapuram, Kochi and Kozhikode. This is where food items seized from hotels are checked and results are determined. It is learned that even the samples received in these labs six months ago have not been scientifically tested. Another plight is that the officers who have to go for inspection do not have a government vehicle. If a vehicle is rented, the government will not pay that amount on time!

One way to make inspections and procedures more accurate and efficient is to reduce the jurisdiction area of each food safety officer. To implement this, the number of inspectors should be increased. Instead, the government is moving to increase the number of district officers responsible for coordinating the inspectors. There is no point in adding inspectors without allowing them government vehicles to travel in. Strict action should be taken against the murderers. Now is the time for urgent attention of the government in all these matters.