CHENNAI: The Tamil Nadu Food Safety department has launched a crackdown to ensure quality packaged drinking water is provided to residents even as a study points out that water quality in nearly 30 per cent of bubble top cans in Chennai, is not up to the World Health Organisation (WHO) standards.
The study ‘Packaged Drinking Water Quality Characteristics at Chennai City’ published in International Journal of Structural and Civil Engineering, says that water quality of bottled water is excellent and almost 97 per cent of packaged bottles are excellent to drink. However, it is not true when it comes to bubble top cans and sachets of water as the quality is not up to the World Health Organisation standards, says the study.
The study done by JS Sudarsan, assistant professor, National Institute of Construction Management and Research (NICMAR) and a team of students, has stated that the manufacturers before re-filling the bubble top cans, need to do proper sterilisation.
“During the manufacturing process, the membrane used in the reverse osmosis process, should be back washed properly. Bubble top cans and sachets of water need some more degree of treatment before consumption,” says Sudarsan, who has done the study when he was in School of Civil Engineering, SRM University.
Talking to Express, Sudarshan said the study was carried out in two phases. One was in Chennai in 2017 and another in Kancheepuram in 2018. Samples were collected from 40 key locations in Chennai from various vendors and subjected to physical, chemical and bacteriological analysis. World Health Organization (WHO) standards were adopted for calculation of Water Quality Index (WQI) which provides an easy and rapid method of monitoring of water quality, says Sudarshan.
Recalling the study which was published in the journal, Sudarshan says that it was found that in most of the areas, the cans were not properly cleaned and some don’t have the date of manufacture label. Authorities need to remain vigilant to ensure whether the ISI marks are genuine or not.
“Many bubble top cans are kept in local shops for months and people are not aware of it. In some places, the labels are removed but water remains the same,” says Sudarshan.
The study highlights that water quality of bubble top cans in Egmore, Triplicane, Tidel Park, Purusawalkam and Besant Nagar, are found to be sub-standard.
Dr A Ramakrishnan, Designated Officer, Office of the Deputy Director of Health Services, told Express that his department on Wednesday launched a crackdown on unsafe packaged drinking water.
“Today we inspected 35 vehicles transporting bubble top cans. A total of 30,632 bubble top cans were checked. We found 649 cans to be defective, which were seized,” says Ramakrishnan.
He said that 48 of the cans seized, had a licensed number which had expired. “We have informed the Thiruvallur district administration about the manufacturer whose license number has expired,” said Ramakrishnan.
He also said there had been misbranding of 204 cans. In all, while 245 bubble top cans had improper labelling, 152 of them were soiled and damaged. “We had split our teams into three and asked them to monitor each and every location which included checking of vehicles and retail shops,” said Ramakrishnan.
He said his officials are checking whether proper labelling is being carried out, whether the bottle is properly packed and sealed and it’s expiry date. “We are also checking whether the cans are transparent and crystal clear,” he added.
He also urged people to register their complaints about bubble top cans or issues pertaining to mangoes or food safety to WhatsApp complaint number 9444042322.