Few can tide over love to see the flaws. That explains Delhi's bond with its street food . It's not easy to hold back when your taste buds crave for some chatpate chhole bhathure, crispy kachouris or steamy momos. The burnt oil or adulterated spices that go into in their making are hardly a put off or so has a research team at Institute of Home Economics (IHE) found.
As part of a study - Ensuring Access to Safe Street Food - the research team, including faculty and students of the institute, surveyed 500 consumers and 250 street food vendors across the city.
The consumers were mostly university students aged between 18 and 23, for whom street food meant a yummy meal with friends at low costs. Around 74 per cent of them gorged on street food simply for its unmatched taste. A little over half of them admitted to have fallen ill after consuming street food and around 43 per cent of the students who were surveyed said they had to take medication to get better, but despite that they did not lose their appetite for roadside delights.
Matter of choice
A majority of respondents (62.8 per cent) reported that they were aware of adulterated ingredients and food-borne diseases, though 56 per cent consumers said they did not know about the source of contamination. A majority of them agreed that they ate street food for its taste while 42 per cent were simply floored with the variety on offer by the road.
"We found a lot of adulteration when we tested the food samples collected from vendors from different parts of the city. Even the oil samples tested were rancid," said Dr Parveen Pannu, principal investigator of the project and associate professor, department of communication and extension at IHE. She further said, "At many locations we found that vendors kept a bucket of water as the only source for preparing food.""And they also washed their hands with that water many times during the day," said.
Pannu, who started surveying the street foodies and vendors last June along with Dr Sunita Aggarwal, associate professor from department of microbiology and Deepshikha Kataria, who is an assistant professor from the department of food and nutrition.
The collection and testing of samples continued till this January for the project sponsored by Delhi University. The team laid its hands on all possible snacks popular among college students, including samosa, tikki, bread pakora, kachori, moong dal laddoo, chowmein, momos, fried rice, bhallepapri, bhelpuri, chhole bhature, pao bhaji, chhole kulche, rajma chawal and beverages such as lemonade.
Out of 10 fat samples tested, eight were found to have high acid value. All 10 oil samples had high peroxide value. Pannu said peroxides and free fatty acids can form free radicals in the body causing ill effects on health.
"The aim of our project was not to suggest that people should stop eating street food. Many of these vendors are illiterate and do not understand the concept of hygiene and food safety. They need to be made aware," said Pannu. For the purpose of the survey, the city was divided into five zones - north, south, east, west, central - and consumers and vendors were asked if they followed any hygiene standards.
The regulation
To make sure foodies do not end up sick, the government enforced the Food Safety and Standards (FSS) Act 2006 on August 5, 2011 across the country. According to the new rules, every food business with an annual turnover below Rs.12 lakh will have to register with the state health department. Those earning more will need a licence to operate.
A penalty of up to Rs.10 lakh can be imposed for sale of unhygienic and adulterated food. The penalty earlier was anything between Rs.500 and Rs.5,000.
There are nearly 60,000 to 80,000 street food vendors in the city, according to the National Association of Street Food Vendors of India (NASVI).
However, the process of their registration hasn't yet begun.
"We need proper infrastructure to initiate such a huge task. Our only office at Lawrence Road is not adequate for the purpose. We are planning to open offices in different zones to carry out the registration process area-wise. It will take at least two more months," said a senior government official.
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