NEW DELHI MAY 23
The Food Safety and Standards Authority of India is for the first time looking at steps to ensure safety and quality of drinking water offered or sold through vending machines. In a draft notification, it has proposed amendments that will put drinking water vending machines under the ambit of packaged drinking water regulations.
All the packaged drinking water needs to have BIS certification along with the FSSAI licence. However, drinking water vending machines are not required to follow this rule. The draft regulations propose to exempt such machine from BIS certification but getting FSSAI licence will be mandatory. “It has become a necessity to regulate these operations so as to ensure the safety and quality of water obtained from water vending machines,” the food safety authority said.
The standards for Packaged Drinking Water have been specified in the Food Safety and Standards (Food Products Standards and Food Additives) Regulations-2011. Drinking water vending machines are especially prevalent across public places, including railway stations. Some of them are coin-operated vending machines and are aimed to offer drinking water at cheaper prices than packaged water companies.
“FSSAI has, therefore, proposed an amendment to the existing Standards of Packaged Drinking Water. In the said proposal such drinking water shall have to comply with parameters specified for Packaged Drinking Water,” according to FSSAI’s draft notification.
“ However, drinking water sold or offered through vending machines is proposed to be exempt from the requirement of Certification Mark of BIS,” the draft notification added.
The Food Safety regulator has now sought comments from various stakeholders on this proposed draft notification.
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