‘Foreign particles found in two packaged water bottles’

Balakrishna K., rights activist, showing the bottle with foreign particles to presspersons in Udupi on Saturday.

Members of a human rights group have urged the district administration to take action against a local packaged water bottle manufacturing company, as foreign particles were seen in two of its sealed drinking water bottles.

Addressing presspersons here on Saturday, Balakrishna K., general secretary of State unit of International Human Rights Action Committee, said that some members of his committee, who had attended a wedding at Udyavara last week were given a sealed water bottle manufactured by a packaged water bottle company near Udupi. But they found a dead spider in it.

When he (Mr. Balakrishna) went to purchase a water bottle from a retail outlet in Udupi on July 3, he got another bottle of the same company and it had foreign particles floating in it. He showed both the sealed bottles at the press meet here.

No details

Mr. Balakrishna said that though both the bottles carried an ISI mark, they had no other details such as batch number, date when it was packed or maximum retail price. This was a violation of the law, he said. .

The sealed water bottles from this company were widely circulated in the district. People consuming water from bottles containing foreign particles might suffer food poisoning, he said.

The district administration should immediately confiscate water bottles of this company and take immediate legal action against it, he said.

“We will take up the matter with the State government ,” Mr. Balakrishna said. Meanwhile, Kumara, Additional Deputy Commissioner, told The Hindu that the Food Safety Officer had already visited the factory of the company and collected samples from there.

“The samples would be sent to a lab in Mysuru for testing. Based on the report from the lab, action would be taken,” he said.

The Food Safety Officer had also been told to look into the issue of non-publication of batch number, manufacturing and expiry dates on the bottles, Mr. Kumara said.

Food Safety Officer collects samples from the compay