Timely medical treatment saved his eye-sight and face.
Nagpur: In what could be termed as food poisoning, a restaurant owner had to face very adverse reaction to his eating packaged Salted Pumpkin from Jamnagari Farsan Bhandar on October 28, 2015.
According to the victim Rajendra Gulwade aged 41 years and a resident of Khare Town Dharampeth and proprietor of Hotaste Biryani Restaurant near Shankar Nagar Square on North Ambazhari Road, had purchased a packet of Packaged Salted Pumpkin of Tong Garden Company from Jamnagari Farsan Bhandar in Dharampeth area for his son on October 23, 2015. However, the son had a providential escape when the son forgot to eat the Salted Pumpkin.
On the next day i.e. October 24, 2015 at around 8 am, as usual he went to Hanuman Temple situated in Ramnagar. Before leaving home, the victim had opened the packet and ate some chunks of Salted Pumpkin. When he reached the temple, some people had told him that his face looked swollen. When he saw his own image in the mirror in the temple, he panicked. Within minutes, his face got swollen up and affected his eye-sight too and he could not see anything.
Somehow his family members rushed him to Dr Karandikar’s Clinic situated between Shankar Nagar Square and Bajaj Nagar Square. He started treatment of the victim and his eye-sight could be saved after treatment of three-four days. However, he realized that since he had a good physique and enjoyed good health, he could withstand the pain and could be saved from very adverse reactions. He thought to himself, that had his son consumed the Salted Pumpkin, he would have certainly lost his eye-sight or an eventuality could have occurred. This made his resolve stronger to take action against the company that manufactured this stuff and the store which is selling the stuff.
The victim then contacted Nagpur Today and related the entire episode and his trauma that he had to undergo after consuming Salted Pumpkin. Swinging into action, Nagpur Today contacted the Joint Commissioner of Food and Drug Administration Shivaji Desai. He in-turn instructed the Assistant Commissioner of Food and Drug Administration Narsingh Wakode to take implicit action.
Assistant Commissioner of Food and Drug Administration Narsingh Wakode took the victim Rajendra Gulwade and Nagpur Today Reporter to his office, where he registered his complaint. After registering the complaint, Wakode directed the Food Safety Inspector Praveen Umap to accompany the victim and Nagpur Today staff to the store.
At Jamnagari Farsan Bhandar, the manager claimed that they do not sell the product. However, the Food Safety Inspector Praveen Umap raided his premises and seized five packets of the Packaged Salted Pumpkin of Tong Garden Company.
He sealed the seized packets and sent it for examination to their laboratory. It was learnt at the Jamnagari Farsan Bhandar that they used to be supplied the packets from a wholesale dealer and Superstockist named Rohini Traders, Maskasath. The Food Safety Inspector Praveen Umap reported the matter to his superiors who instructed him to take action against the Wholesaler and Super-stockist too.
However, Nagpur Today would like to caution the citizens to carefully check the manufacturing date, the date of expiry and to smell the product before consuming the product. It has come to fore that many unscrupulous elements paste a small sticker over the date of expiry and resell the goods at stores where such kind of examination is not done. Another such unscrupulous element used to use a permanent marker to change the date of expiry and sell it to small-time stores in slum areas at cheap rates.
By Ravikant Kamble
