Karnataka eateries, pharmacies to display QR codes for instant safety complaints

Bengaluru: Restaurants, eateries and pharmacies across Karnataka will have to display QR codes allowing consumers to lodge complaints on food and drug safety, Health Minister UT Khader said on Monday, as the state stepped up enforcement against food adulteration and safety violations.

The QR-code initiative, developed by the state Food Safety and Drugs Administration in collaboration with the Centre for e-Governance, is the first-of-its-kind initiative in the country, Khader said. Consumers can scan the code to register complaints, track their status and facilitate faster action. Complaints can be filed under food and drug safety categories.

The initiative follows an intensive statewide enforcement drive covering hotels, hostels, eateries, roadside dhabas and e-commerce food warehouses. Officials seized 378 kg of mislabelled mutton and chicken without expiry dates, 51 kg of expired meat, 203 kg of fish with excessively long expiry dates, 200 kg of vegetarian food stored with non-vegetarian food, 76 kg of rotten or mould-affected vegetables and 45 litres of expired milk and curd.


The department inspected 629 Backward Classes hostels and collected 1,860 food samples for laboratory analysis. Another 331 Social Welfare Department hostels were inspected and 556 samples collected.

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At 186 bus stations, officials inspected 889 food establishments and issued notices to 206 for unhygienic conditions. Fines of Rs 55,000 were collected. The drive also covered 99 roadside dhabas along highways connecting Nelamangala, Tumakuru, Chitradurga, Davanagere and Haveri, with fines totalling Rs 3.67 lakh.

Following complaints over unhygienic preparation and use of artificial colours in shawarma and kebabs, officials collected 41 shawarma and 21 kebab samples. Nine shawarma samples and one kebab sample were found unsafe, with legal action initiated.

Officials also inspected 236 e-commerce food warehouses. Proceedings against 44 warehouses are under way, while eight were fined Rs 1.97 lakh for unhygienic conditions.

In Bengaluru Urban, 30 teams inspected more than 60 three-star and five-star hotels, eight warehouses and four international restaurants, issuing notices to 30 food business operators.

The drive also covered food establishments near 124 schools and colleges, yielding 53 samples for testing. Thirty-six egg mayonnaise samples were collected statewide. Four teams inspecting milk and milk-product establishments in Bengaluru Urban, Chamarajanagar and Mysuru collected 25 samples, of which one was found substandard.

The department said 11,370 food business operators had been trained under FSSAI's Food Safety Training and Certification programme.