Daijiworld Media Network

Bengaluru, March 2: The Food Safety and Drug Administration in Karnataka, has found 26 out of 31 samples of fried green peas to be unsafe after testing them for artificial colours.

A total of 106 samples of green peas were collected and other results are awaited. This is a part of their ongoing drives to test food safety and quality across the state, as announced by the state health minister Dinesh Gundu Rao.

"Banned colouring agents such as sunset yellow, tetrazine have been found in them. These are banned and likely carcinogenic and should not be used at all. This is causing some concern for us," he said.

Following the announcement of a ban on plastic sheet usage in preparing idlis, the state health department issued notices to 52 eateries found using them across the state, after inspecting nearly 681 food establishments. Twelve of these are in Bengaluru Urban district and eight of which are in BBMP limits.

The FDA has also found that the usage of artificial colours in cakes has reduced. Last August, 295 cake samples were collected and analysed and 12 samples (4.06%) were found unsafe. They did a special drive following up on the use of artificial and unsafe colours in January and found only seven out of 603 cake samples across the state to be unsafe, said the minister.

The department is also analysing 288 water samples from drinking water bottles as part of a special campaign launched in February.

As part of their routine inspections, the FDA has collected and analysed 3,608 food samples in January and 2,543 samples in February. Of these, the administration has declared a total of 34 samples "unsafe" and 33 samples "poor quality".